Modern Hyrule
by silver neko baka
Summary: A Zelda theme park is a dream come true for most Zelda fans. That's what I thought when I bought the tickets for my friends and I. But when strange happenings begin taking place, we all begin to wonder if there's more to this place than meets the eye.
1. Link Hats and Hyperactive Kids

**Hello everyone! Just let me say that since I'm already working on Dovetail, this story might not be frequently updated, as I can multitask skillfully at almost anything except "the second story" but I wanted to get started on this idea while "the force was with me." This story is actually based off a dream I had a couple of months back that I never actually forgot because it was so crazy but failed to recall some of the details until I dug out my journal and found a record of it. Anyway, part of the dream itself will be changed/added/deleted, as they made no sense what-so-ever. I just wanted to clear that up before you get to far into this story. Please enjoy and leave a review on your way out ^_^**

**Disclaimer: Do I look Japanese? No, I don't think so! Therefore I cannot be the owner of Legend of Zelda. If I was Gannondork would have bit the big one a loooooong time ago and Vaati and Ghirahim would have taken over as the main villains, for they are more awesome than Gannonpork could ever hope to be.**

My three friends and I stood outside the chain link fence surrounding the large theme park. Unfortunately, I was the only one who actually seemed to give a care about where we happened to be. When I had heard that a Legend of Zelda theme park was opening near where we lived I had been chomping at the bit for weeks until I finally wore my mom down enough to get her to cave.

Though, I suppose I should have filled my friends in a bit more about our destination. I had showed up at school waving around three tickets (in addition to my own) that said "Admit One" without giving the name of the park or any additional information.

They had been ecstatic at the prospect of going to a park because there are none nearby in North Carolina unless you count the county fair that rolls through every October. None of us ever get to go to a park that stays in its location permanently unless we were to go to Bushe Gardens in Virginia.

What I hadn't mentioned was the park was Zelda themed, and I was the only one in my group of friends who actually played the games. Which was probably why as we stood outside the gates, two were giving me vacant stares and the other was glaring at me in a very annoyed fashion.

"Really, Ruby?" Ginger asked glaring at me and then glaring at the sign, "Usually, I think you're pretty smart. But when it comes to these game and anime type things, I sometimes wonder about you."

"You're one to talk!" I snapped, somehow managing to sound angry and stare dreamily at the sign on the front gate, "Miss wii-rock-band-rocks-socks!"

"Now there's something I'd like to see," she stated, crossing her arms, "A Rock Band theme park built around here instead of this stupid 'Modern Hyrule' place."

Ginger looked even more pumped for a Rock Band theme park, with her dark blue jeans, heart-breaker T-shirt, black leather jacket, and those orange highlights in her hair that I swear, if you looked directly at them you'd go blind.

I was about to ask her how the freakin' HECK you could build a theme park based on Wii Rock Band when another of my friends, Dakota, jumped in.

"Now personally, I think it might be fun," she challenged Ginger, "after all, you never know until you try!"

Dakota usually stands up for me whenever something like this comes up. But she makes up for it when she picks on me because I like Bleach. It really doesn't matter though, because I know she's just messing with me when she does that.

Ginger "hmphed" and returned to her contemplation of the design for a Rock Band theme park while we waited for the gates to open. I had purposefully told them to meet me an hour before it opened so we could be the first ones through the gate. Unfortunately, it appeared that I wasn't the only one with that idea. Something that further ticked Ginger off after she found out how many people were gathered outside and how early we were.

I sighed and rubbed the bridge of my nose before turning to my last friend. "So what say you, Kevin?" I asked.

Kevin looked at me, seeming a bit uncomfortable at the fact that he was the only boy in our little group. "I don't know," he shrugged, "I guess it might be fun."

Then he gave me a truly chilling smile. "You know what would make it even MORE fun?" he asked.

"What?" I replied nervously.

"If you'd let me wear your stupid hat!" he cried, reaching up and snatching the Shadow Link style cosplay hat off my head.

"Hey!" I shouted, attempting to reclaim the lost hat.

Kevin ran off toward the gate, laughing all the way with me pursuing him.

"I've got the stupid Link hat!" he shouted, before tripping over his own feet and landing on his face in the middle of the path leading to the gate and (the gate not the path) had unfortunately just opened.

Poor Kevin stood up only to be nearly trampled to death by a crowd of crazed Zelda fans. It was probably a bit cruel but as soon as the storm passed I trotted over to him and reclaimed my Shadow Link hat.

"You lose, punk!" I laughed replacing it on my head.

"Aww, but **I **wanted to wear the stupid hat!" he whined, pretending to pout.

I rolled my eyes and helped him to his feet before taking a normal, green Link hat from my shoulder bag and plopping it on his head. Kevin pumped his fist in the air and went flying through the open gate while screaming, "look every one! I'm a nerd wearing a stupid Link hat!" earning him laughs and a few dirty looks from the more serious Zelda fans.

I shook my head and motioned for Dakota and Ginger to follow me. We were finally in and from the looks of it, we would have to catch up with Kevin before anything else.

O#O#O#O#O#O#O

"Excuse me!" I cried, pushing through crowds of people in an attempt find the hyperactive boy.

"Figures," Ginger snorted, "we're in this park for five seconds and Kevin's already managed to get himself lost."

"Why don't we split up and go look for him?" Dakota suggested, pulling several maps from the nearby sign and handing them out, "We're in the Hyrule Castle Town Market right now, let's meet back here in an hour to regroup if we don't find him.

Ginger nodded, "sounds good," she agreed, "we should find that knucklehead within the hour, though. I'll search from here to the castle. Dakota, you take the area from here to the Minish Village. And Ruby, you take from here and search this area, the Faron Woods."

"Geeze Gin," I said, "I don't know, the Faron Woods is a pretty big area."

Ginger rolled her eyes, "then knowing him, that's where he ran off to. Now get going, you!"

She turned and stomped off in her assigned direction while Dakota and I headed off in ours. Here we were in the most awesome park known to man and we had to look for a hyper kid before we could check anything else out! When we found Kevin, I was going to smack him hard on that pointed head of his!


	2. Catch That Rabbit!

**Thanks to ****Msfcatlover, LegendofZeldaFreak, and Piezelle**** for reviewing my last chapter. This is where things will get… interesting.**

**Ruby: I didn't like the way you paused before saying "interesting…"**

**Silver: Shush! You're the OC! You have no say in the matter!**

**Ruby: Wanna bet? *holds up a sign that says "SUPPORT THE MARCH AGAINST OC ABUSE."**

**I do not own Legend of Zelda. If I did I would develop a Zelda game that looks entirely realistic. (Now THAT would be cool).**

_**Chapter 2: Catch That Rabbit!**_

The thing about Kevin is he's small and he can hide in places that the average person can't. To make things worse, you almost never find him unless he WANTS you to find him. To sum it all up, this was going to be one heck of a rabbit hunt.

I boarded the Spirit Train at the edge of Hyrule Castle Town so I wouldn't have to walk all the way to the Faron Woods, which were almost all the way across the park. If there was one thing I've learned from Bushe Gardens USA, is if you don't want to begin wondering if your feet are still attached to your body or if they snapped off at some point in time, the tram or train or whatever they have is the smartest way to get around.

"You getting on, little lady?" the conductor (who of course was dressed like Link in order to set the mood) asked when he noticed me zoned out and not paying any attention to the fact that the train had arrived.

"Oro?" I asked, "I mean, huh?" I corrected when I caught the conductor giving me a funny look.

"S-sorry!" I blushed, climbing onto the platform.

"No need to apologize," he said, "That happens to me all the time. What was with the 'Oro' thing though? You from Japan?"

"N-no," I stammered, "I-I just take Japanese. Sorry, it just comes out sometimes when I'm not thinking straight."

"Ha!" he pointed to himself, "Happens to me too. I think it happens to EVERYONE who's bi-lingual and has a habit of zoning. Uh, n-not when I drive the train though!"

I smiled and got on the train. The conductor shut the door behind me and walked to the engine of the miniature train. I took a seat and proceeded to stare out the window absently for a bit.

"Something on your mind?" someone beside me asked.

A Vio cosplayer and his three companions had taken the seats near me and Vio seemed to be rather uncertainly observing everyone in the car.

"No," I said, "I'm just thinking."

"You looking for someone around this place?" he persisted.

"I don't see how that's any of your business," I replied, I'm not naturally rude, actually, I'm usually a fairly polite person, but this guy was REALLY annoying me, and kind of freaking me out as well.

"Okay!" he said defensively, "I was just going to offer to help!"

"Yeah well, thank you very much, but I'm doing fine on my own," I replied.

"You know," the Green cosplayer said, getting up from his seat and taking the seat on the other side of me, "It's okay to want to do something on your own, but it doesn't hurt to ask for help once in a while."

I studied his expression but no matter how hard I looked I really couldn't find anything to indicate that I couldn't trust this guy. I sighed and looked at the four Links on either side of me.

"I'm looking for a boy wearing dark green shirt with the words "step away from the chocolate and nobody gets hurt" on it, jeans, and a green Link hat. He has dark brown hair, brown eyes and glasses. He's about yay tall," I stood and put my hand up to my shoulder, "and he's probably certifiable. Does that help?"

The one in red nodded. "We'll keep an eye out," he said, placing a hand on my shoulder, "don't worry about him."

"Yeah," the one in purple said, "as soon as we find a short, certifiable, kid with glasses, we'll let you know."

I nodded. "Here's my stop," I said, jumping up when the train pulled into the Faron Woods station, "Thanks for the help!"

(Someone's POV)

_Well there's a interesting bit of information,_ I thought, _I suppose it's safe to assume that all four of these brats are off on their own. That's good, it'll make things SO much easier for us._

"I believe this is my stop as well," I said, swinging the door open and exiting after the girl.

After all, half the fun of hunting is the thrill of the chase.

(Back to Ruby's POV)

The Faron Woods, dense, dark, and full of… well… trees. I hated to admit it, but this looked EXACTLY like Kevin's idea of a good hiding place. Though there was most definitely a jumble of games, rides, and vendors selling goods back behind those trees, it certainly didn't remove the image of Moblins and Keese out there as well from my mind. Shoot, there went my stupid, overactive imagination again.

_Okay, just move your foot!_ I ordered myself, _You're being totally stupid. This is a theme park in modern times, not a fantasy world in the medieval age! _

Though my imagination continued to run away with me, I began to make my way towards the entrance to the forest.

I gasped out loud when I entered the forest area. Can you say "exact replica of the Kokiri Village?" I mean EVERYTHING was perfect! It was absolutely amazing! When I found Kevin, I was going to drag him back here with me and force him to look at all the stuff he had delayed us in checking out!

I strolled away from the replica of the village, sharply looking at every detail of anyplace Kevin could be hiding. And unfortunately, not having any luck in finding him.

I looked down at a sign that read "DO NOT STRAY FROM THE PATH" and snorted. "Like Kevin follows rules," I muttered stomping off the path and heading deeper into the dense grove of trees.

Something rustled in the bushes. I whirled around to face the sound. Another rustle, I smirked to myself and crawled over to the bush. Kevin had messed with us one too many times, this time I was going to scare the jeebers out of HIM before he had a chance to jump out at me. Oh yes, this was gonna be fun, and truckloads of it too!

I slowly began to part the leaves then suddenly threw them aside with one swift motion.

"Got y—" the words died in my mouth, I couldn't move, I couldn't back up or even look away. The absolute UGLIEST, most realistic moblin I had ever seen in my life pulled its lips back in a snarl and let out a screech that didn't improve my paralyzed state at all.

"WATCH OUT!" someone shouted, giving me what was probably the world's most powerful flying tackle and knocking me out of the way just as the creature charged at the place where I had been before.

"Ung!" I landed on my face a few feet away from the bush with the person who had tackled me on top of me.

"Are you STUPID?" he shouted, "When something's about to charge you, you don't take the time to introduce yourself to it, you MOVE!"

"Y-you saved me," I gasped.

"Well now, don't jump to conclusions, girl," he said, "I didn't do it for you."

A cold sword blade pressed against my throat. _Oh crap, oh crap, oh CRAP!_ I thought. I began to choke from my panic and stupidly tried to turn my head to see the man who had grabbed me. Like I said, stupid. The blade cut me slightly, after which I gasped and stopped struggling.

"Fortunately for you," he said, "I won't kill you… yet." He added.

_OH CRAP!_ My mind screamed.

I guess what my uncle always told me was right, not everyone who gets you into a mess is your enemy, and not everyone who gets you out of one is your friend.


	3. David Bowie WTF

**Heh, the torment is over for I intend to foil the evil cliffhanger today. I would like to think everyone who reviewed since we have one of those wireless boxes from Verizon and it's currently not up so I can check all your names but, you know who you are. **

**Disclaimer: I do not own Legend of Zelda. If I did Modern Hyrule would be an existing park, the Spirit Train would run through it, and there WOULD be cute Link cosplayers on board.**

**Onward into the great blue yonder!**

**Chapter 3: David Bowie WTF!**

"Oh CRAPSICKLES!" I shouted, not realizing that I had actually said anything out loud until a gloved hand slid over my mouth. "Mmph!"

"Quiet you little brat!" my captor hissed, "do you want to alert the entire park?"

_YES!_ I tried to scream, but it came out as "Mmhpp!"

He pressed the blade against my throat. "If I take my hand off my mouth, are you going to scream again?" he asked.

I shook my head and his hand slid away. "Please, don't hurt me!" I whimpered.

Now, allow me to say that I know that was pretty pathetic, and I mentally kicked myself afterwards for that action. But in my own defense, I had just been assaulted by a psycho who was now threatening me with a sword at my throat. I ask you, do you REALLY think that you would have reacted any differently in my situation?

My attacker chuckled with amusement at the reaction. "Don't worry, I won't hurt you. IF you do as I say."

"W-who are you?" I asked, not really meaning to or particularly wanting to know the answer.

"Oh my," he said, "Where are my manners?"

Before I could say anything or take the question back I was roughly jerked around to face the man. "H-h… W-wh… g-gnh…" I stammered, none of it coming out as the actual sentence I was trying to form, which was "OH HECK WHAT THE FUDGE?" Except perhaps with slightly stronger language.

I took a step back and tripped over my own feet in my shock.

"Is something wrong?" he asked, "You look so scared."

"Well no CRAP, Sherlock!" I gasped, "When some psycho Ghirahim cosplayer holds a sword to my throat and threatens me, I have a right to be scared witless!"

"Hm, perhaps," he said, pointing the sword directly between my eyes, which let me tell you, is NOT a pleasant sensation, "Perhaps it's better for a weak little human like you to assume I'm just another of those cosplaying ninnies walking around here."

I scrambled back a few feet. The cosplayer advanced a few steps, but allowed me a bit more space, observing my reaction with dark humor.

"Okay, okay! This… this is a joke," I laughed nervously, "This is just a joke! That's it! This is a big, long, and kind of terrifying joke!"

"No joke," he said plainly, advancing a few more paces towards me, "humans are such simple-minded fools."

"U-um-" I stammered.

"What happened to all that confidence you had a moment ago?" he mocked, "It's not gone, is it?" his lips curled back in a devilish smile.

"Y-you're not telling me t-that y-you're…" I stammered.

"You little humans do have the most amusing expressions when you're scared for your pathetic lives," he laughed.

I backed up further until my back hit a tree that was directly behind me. I admit, I knew people could get a bit over obsessive about things and I myself was probably in or somewhere close to that category when it came to Zelda, but stating or implying that you ARE a Zelda character, that's cause to get the men in the white coats on the line!

"Now," he said, appearing behind me, pinning my arms behind my back, and pressing the sword against my throat once again, "where are your little friends."

"Umn…" I whimpered.

"Don't worry little one, didn't I say I wouldn't hurt you?" he asked, "Just answer the question," his face darkened.

I shook my head.

"Really? Is that so?" he asked, twisting my wrist slightly until I gave a yelp of pain, "While you're still feeling defiant, allow me to plant this little thought in your head. We need all of you for reasons, which at the time, are none of your business. But until that time comes, it doesn't matter what condition you're in, as long as you're still alive, that is. Now, knowing that, won't you cooperate before I do something… unpleasant?"

I shook my head again.

"Very well then," he snorted, "Pity it had to come to this."

I shut my eyes, as I was not extremely eager to see what he was about to do, when I heard a familiar voice.

"Hey you!" someone shouted, "Let her go!"

The psycho cosplayer looked up to see who had spoken. "What are YOU doing here?" he spat venomously, roughly tossing me to the ground.

Or at least, I would have hit the ground, if one of my saviors hadn't quickly run and caught me. I immediately recognized the Green cosplayer from before.

"Are you alright?" he asked.

"I-I think so," I stammered, "Actually I-I th-think I'm more shaken up than anything."

"Good to hear," the boy said, heaving a sigh of relief and turning to face the other cosplayer.

"Tch!" the Ghirahim cosplayer snorted, "It seems you have a group of guardians. How fortunate for you, but don't celebrate quite yet I'll be back for you!"

He clicked his fingers and just kind of disappeared in a group of diamonds. My breach caught in my throat for a moment at the unnatural sight. What the HECK had I just witnessed?

(line break goes here)

"Hey!" I shouted, waving the Spirit Train down, which must have seemed a bit odd to the passengers considering that the train had not yet arrived at a station, "Hey, STOP!"

The driver from earlier slammed on breaks when he saw me, throwing just about everyone in the passenger car for a loop in the process. He threw open the door and came running out.

"Are you alright? What happened?" he asked in a fluster, "Oh geeze! You're bleeding!" he took off his Link hat and pressed it to the shallow cut on my neck to stop the bleeding.

"Nani?" I asked, loosing track of my English in my flustered state, "Am I? Well, that tends to happen when a cosplaying PSYCHOPATH threatens you with a sword!"

"Someone did what?" he shouted in disbelief, "Like a PLASTIC sword?"

"No, like a LIVE BLADE sword!" I retorted.

"Oh man!" he shook his head, "This is bad!"

I didn't have any qualms about following him when he pulled me onto the train. I just wanted to get as far away from that crazy as possible.

"Oh my GOD!" Ginger shouted, "What happened to you?"

All three of my companions were sitting in the car staring at me in shock. Ginger looked about ready to faint, normally that would prompt me to make some kind of quip about how she shouldn't watch so many horror movies, but frankly I was too shaken up to do so at the moment.

"Could you please put this train in drive and head towards the exit as fast as humanly possible?" I asked the driver.

He nodded. "I'll call the cops once I know you kids are safe," he said.

"What happened?" Kevin asked.

"I-I-I was- and a- and he-and then-" I stammered.

"You guys, let her calm down!" Dakota said, putting her arm around my shoulder and walking me to an empty seat. "Now just catch your breath and then fill us in."

I took a few deep breaths to calm myself down. I filled them in detail by detail and I must have done a pretty good job of telling the story because now they looked even more freaked out than I was.

"You're sure he mentioned the three of us as well?" Ginger asked, eyes wide.

I nodded. "I-I'm really freaked out."

"You'd be crazy not to be," Kevin said, "That crap is SCARY!"

I shuddered and looked down at my costume. I couldn't get that one instant where my attacker had disappeared right before my eyes. I was sure of one thing, whether he was a cosplayer or not, one thing was certain, that was NOT a human action.

(line break goes here)

"Do you know someone named Matt Aligood?" my mom asked, plunking a letter down on the table in front of me.

It was a two weeks after the incident. Dakota was over at my house eating breakfast with us. She looked at me "Who's that, goose? Your boyfriend?"

"I've never heard of him," I replied, "And you, don't call me Goose! Only my dad can get away with that!"

"Well, whoever he is, he sent you a letter," my mom said, "that's weird."

I grabbed the letter and tore it open. Nothing makes you wonder about the contents of a letter more than it being from someone you don't know.

_Dear Ruby,_

_That is your name, right? Your friend Ginger was kind enough to give me your name and address._

"Ooh, looks like Ginger's playing match-maker, eh Goose?" Dakota teased.

"Shut up!" I snapped and went back to reading.

_Though I know you must still be shaken up by that rather disturbing experience the other day, I would appreciate it very much if you and your friends would consider returning to the park. I have something I would like to show you. I completely understand if you don't wish to come back, but I would really love it if you did. I hope you're feeling better,_

_Your friend,_

_Matt Aligood, spirit train conductor._

"Are we going?" Dakota asked, as I reached into the envelope and drew out five admission tickets to Modern Hyrule.

"I don't know about you guys, but I guess I'll go. After all, he WAS awfully nice that day and it WOULD be rude to say no. He seems really eager to show me this thing," I said.

"Fine," Dakota rolled her eyes, "But can it wait until this afternoon? I have to meet my cousin, Lya, at the airport later."

"You're my best buddy!" I said, leaning back on my chair and wondering what it was Matt wanted to show us, "Oh! I'll call the others!" I said, making a mad dash for the phone. After all, there's safety in numbers.


	4. Lya Arrives

**Hello peoples! I guess today we're going to meet Dakota's cousin, Lya, Also, I would like to let everybody know what I have planned for the story is to keep it as one file up here but split it up into three arcs. "The Modern Hyrule arc" "The Mage's Quest arc" and "the Return Journey arc," this way I can take the story in the direction I want it to go in without frying people's brains with one ridiculously long one-part story. I would also like to point out that doing things this way makes it easier for me to keep on task and keep track of my ending point so I don't go typing crazy like with the seventy one page "short story" I turned into my ELA teacher last period. Please note that between arcs I may take a break from the story in order to update some of my other stories. Now that you're all filled in, shall we move onward?**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Legend of Zelda, blah, blah, blah. I don't own Lya either, she belongs to Piezelle. :3**

**Chapter 4: Lya's Arrival**

This might sound like a strange thing to say but, I love airports. Seriously, I think they're awesome because I like to think that if I could just get on a plane and go somewhere more exciting than North Carolina, home of the concept of boredom, or at least, I could go far away if I had several hundred bucks, which unfortunately, I don't.

"I hate airports," Ginger said, wrinkling her nose, "they smell weird."

"Nag, nag, nag!" Dakota said, waving one hand in an over dramatic fashion and making the blabber lips sign with the other.

"Well I do!" Ginger snapped, "I hate them! What do they smell like anyway? Crap?"

"You hate heights," I pointed out, "THAT'S what this is about!"

"I do not hate heights!" she sniffed, "I'm perfectly comfortable being off the ground!"

"So she says!" Dakota snickered.

"DAKOTA WILLIAMS! YOU ADMIT THAT I'M RIGHT THIS MINUTE!" Ginger shouted.

"Nag, nag, nag!" Dakota repeated, darting away when Ginger tried to punch her.

"Get back here!" Ginger shouted, chasing the laughing girl a ways away from Kevin and I, "Come here! I'm gonna hit you!"

"NAG, NAG, NAG!" I Dakota screamed back, darting around the corner.

"You know," someone said, "You REALLY shouldn't announce what the punishment will be before the person comes to you."

Kevin and I turned to see an Asian girl in a green t-shirt and brown pants. "Cousin," she said to herself, "It's nice to see you have some sense, that girl's got some anger management problems."

"You must be Lya," Kevin said, walking over to her, "We're with your cousin. Hi I'm Kevin, that's Ruby."

She reached out slowly and shook his hand as if she wasn't quite comfortable with these two strangers greeting her instead of her cousin. "Hi," she said, not in an unfriendly mono-syllable kind of way though, it was more of a I-don't-know-quite-what-to-make-of-this type thing.

"You nervous?" I asked, feeling more comfortable since Kevin had greeted her first. I was never one to go charging up to someone I'd never met and start a conversation.

"Maybe a little," she replied, still not quite sure how to act, "Do you know when Dakota will be back?"

"Who knows," I said, "She won't be back until Ginger's tantrum comes to an end."

"Oh," Lya said, sounding a bit disappointed.

"Which means, we have to go to them!" Kevin said, grabbing her arm and pulling her in the direction Dakota and Ginger had run off in while Lya had a "what the freak?" expression on her face that went unnoticed by him, "C'mon!"

(page break goes here)

"So, Lya," I said, attempting to break the awkward silence with the start of a conversation, "you travel by yourself a lot?"

"Not really," she replied, "This is actually my first time."

"Wow!" Kevin said, "Your parents just let you come to North Carolina from…?"

"New York."

"Come to North Carolina from New York on your own? That's awesome! My parents are even reluctant to let me go to the MALL on my own! You're so lucky!"

"Well, it took a bit of persuasion on my end but they finally caved and let me come. Good news for them, much cheaper for one to fly."

"Wow!" I said my eyes growing wide, "I want to do that sometime!"

"But, aren't you nervous?" Kevin asked, "I mean, something might happen to your plane, then it might go BOOM!"

"Keep talking," Lya said, "You're really making me enthusiastic to get on the plane when I have to go home."

"Kevin, why the heck does everything that finds its way into a conversation anyone tries to have with you, it winds up exploding?" I asked, raising my eyebrow and putting a hand on my hip.

"Because everything's so much COOLER when it blows up! It gets all fiery and shiny and pretty! SPLARSHBANGKABOOM!" He shouted, tearing across the floor and attracting odd looks from the passer-by.

"We have an arsonist among us," I said, slapping Lya on the back, "Now, 'cmon! Let's find Dakota!"

"Mkay," she said.

"And another thing, don't be so shy! Dakota's friends are sue friends!"

"Okay," Lya said trailing behind me and seeming much less nervous than when she got off the plane, "By the way, Ruby, uh, you don't REALLY thing my plane will go all fiery and shiny? Do you?"

(page break goes here)

It had taken the combined strength of Lya and I to pry Ginger off of Dakota, after which Dakota ran back to her mom's car screaming "Keep that woman away from me!" It took another ten minutes for us to calm Ginger as she thrashed and screamed, "GET OFF OF ME! I MEAN IT! I ONCE FLIPPED A GIRL TWICE MY SIZE OVER ONTO THE BLACKTOP AT SCHOOL AND IF YOU DON'T LET GO OF ME I'LL FLIP THE TWO OF YOU OVER TOO!"

It was then Kevin came running past with powdered sugar from some of those mini doughnuts all over his face, screaming "WHEEEEEEEE!" and trying to climb the flag pole. That was when Ginger stopped fighting.

"All right, what diphead let him near the sugar?" she demanded, "I thought we made a pact NEVER to let him consume excessive amounts of sugar again!"

I rolled my eyes ad turned to Lya. "Welcome to Wonderland," I said.

**Thanks for reading the new chapter. The next one will be when they go back to the park and find out what Matt wanted to show Ruby. I just wanted to take this time to introduce the new OC and all that. So yeah, this is Lya's chapter. I already know what I'll do for the next one so it should be up fairly quickly.**


	5. Matt's Castle of Twilight

**Okay, so now that everybody's there and acquainted and all that good stuff, we can get back to the rest of the story. Enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Legend of Zelda, if I did I would make a GOOD series of live action movies for the games and kick Hollywood's sorry butts if they DARED to screw them up.**

**Chapter 5: Matt's Castle of Twilight**

"Are you all settled?" Dakota asked Lya as she exited the guest room.

Lya nodded and looked at the bike helmets the four of us were holding. "Are you going out?" she asked.

"We have… a bit of business to take care of," Ginger said.

"Oh," Lya said, "Location's confidential, huh?"

"We're going to Hyruuuuuuuule!" Kevin sang, still not quite down off his sugar high yet.

Lya's eyebrows raised. "No really, where are you going?"

"A place where only people who don't have lives would have any desire to visit," Ginger said moodily.

"Oh really?" I asked, "Then I'm surprised that you're not chomping at the bit!"

"Fun-ny!" she said, rolling her eyes.

"It's this place called Modern Hyrule that just opened," Dakota said, "It's for Zelda fans, like her." She pointed at me.

I stuck my tongue out. "You're just jealous that Mortal Kombat doesn't have awesome characters like Link!"

"YOU'RE a Zelda fan?" Lya asked.

"And proud of it!" I replied.

"No way!" she said, "Awesome! Me too! I just finished Twilight Princess!"

"Oh my god! That's my third favorite!" I replied.

"One and two?" she asked.

"Exactly this order, Skyward Sword and Spirit Tracks!" I said, "but I also like the Minish Cap."

"Not familiar with it," she said, "I haven't played most of the old games."

"Are you serious?" I asked, "The old games are great! I have an old GBA if you want to try the Minish Cap out."

"That'd be awesome! Thanks!" she replied.

"Oh great," Ginger rolled her eyes, "Another one!"

"You HAVE to come with us to the park!" I said, "This really cool guy named Matt, he works there, has something to show us! And he ONLY wants to show it to us!"

"Ooh, exclusive information! I'm in!" Lya said.

"Here," Ginger said, handing her something, "you can have my ticket. I'm not going."

"Not so fast, Ginger," I said, grabbing the back of her jacket before she could make her way out the door, "Matt gave us FIVE tickets!" I said, thrusting the orange ticket into her hand.

"Well, wasn't that NICE of him?" she snorted, as we climbed on our bikes and rode towards the park.

**(page break thingy goes here)**

Matt met us at the gate with an eager look on his face. "Come in!" he said, "I promise you're gonna LOVE this!" He turned to Lya, "And who's this? A new face. Hi I'm Matt!" he stuck his hand out, and Lya cautiously shook it, "Well, the more the merrier! I gave you that extra ticket for a reason!"

"He's very chatty," Lya said, as we followed Matt to where ever he was leading us.

"Yeah, but at least his chatter lets you know he's friendly," I replied.

We followed Matt to the very back edge of the park, where he stopped in front of an enormous structure that I couldn't believe I hadn't seen at some point before.

"Ta-daa!" he said, "Isn't she beautiful?"

"Oh… my!" Lya said after a brief period of stunned silence.

The building in front of us was an EXACT replica of the Palace of Twilight from Twilight Princess. And man, let me tell you, it was HUGE!

"Come on, come on!" Matt said ushering us towards the door, "It's even greater inside!"

**(page break thingy goes here)**

"This whole place is designed as a roller coaster," Matt said, pointing to the tracks that ran across the floor.

"Really? That's SO cool!" I said, trying to be polite and not tip him off to the fact that I can't STAND roller coasters.

"Of course," he said, "that part's optional. We have this place set up so that people who don't like roller coasters can just kind of walk around and see the sights."

"Now THAT'S cool!" I said.

Matt laughed. "I'm guessing you don't like roller coasters," he said, "The Palace of Twilight doesn't officially open until next week but I thought it wouldn't hurt to sneak in and give some kids a tour of the place."

"Are you saying that we're not supposed to be here?" Lya asked.

"Don't worry about it!" Matt dismissed her question, "Everybody's gone home, including the workers. It's not LIKE we're gonna get caught!"

"I'll go along with that!" I said.

"I'm still not sure." Lya said nervously.

"Hey, come on!" Matt called us from the doorway, "Let's walk around! I want to show you Zant's throne room!"

"Zant's throne room?" Lya asked, suddenly forgetting her uncertainties.

It was almost comical enough to be a cartoon moment, what happened next. Lya and I looked at each other. "WAIT FOR ME!" we both shouted at the same time, tearing off after Matt. I swear I looked back and saw dust buds trailing in the background.

"They get scary when they talk about Zelda," Kevin said as we turned the corner.

**(page break thingy goes here)**

"And THIS is where our secondary antagonist himself spends his time!" Matt announced, spreading his arms wide as he entered the replicated throne room.

"May I?" I asked, walking over to the throne.

"Go ahead," Matt said, "Like I said, there's nobody here to bust us on it!"

"Kevin," I said, "Come here and sit in this throne!"

Kevin walked over and plopped down in the huge throne. "Now repeat after me in a really spazzing voice," I leaned over and whispered some lines in his ear.

"FOOLISH CREATURES OF LIGHT WHO DARE TO ENTER MY PALACE! ARE YOU PREPARED TO MEET YOUR END? AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!" He screamed in a spazzed out voice.

"A perfect match!" Lya clapped.

"Good job, man!" I said, giving him a package of Sweet Sixteen powdered doughnuts. He stuffed them into his mouth, swallowed, then proceeded to break dance back to the entrance.

Matt ran his hand through his hair. "Kid, if it wasn't against child labor laws and we didn't already have someone hired to play the king of twilight, I'd hire you. And you could break dance till your heart was content."

"He really IS the perfect Zant," Lya whispered.

**(page break thingy goes here)**

(Matt's POV)

I waved the five of them goodbye and then turned seriously and headed back to the throne room.

"What do you want us to do?" someone asked.

Five figures emerged from the shadows and looked at me, expecting me to give them further direction.

"Ginger gave me Ruby's school email, not her home one," I said, "I've already filled out enrollment forms for the five of you at the middle school there."

Matt handed one of them a piece of paper. "Are these the directions?" the other person asked.

"Yes," I replied, "Keep an eye on them, will you?"

"Anything we can do to help out," said another, "It seems to be going smoothly so far."

"Yes, so far," Matt said, "But that could change in an instant, so keep your guard up."

The five nodded and headed for the door. "One more thing," Matt called after them.

"Yeah?" they all said at the same time.

"Dress like a NORMAL person in this age!" I groaned.

**(page break thingy goes here)**

(back to Ruby's POV)

Our school is weird. For starters at the beginning and end of the day we sit in a circle on the floor. And we don't have assigned desks, we can pretty much sit with whoever we want. It was at the beginning of math class and both homerooms were in a group meeting, which usually only occurred if someone was in trouble.

"Everyone," Ms. Anderson said," we have some new students!" she gestured to the five boys standing beside her.

"Wow," Ginger said, "Cute! Eh, Ruby? Ruby? Are you zoned out again?"

"Hwa?' I asked, jarred from the perfectly beautiful daydream I had been having. I looked over towards the new kids and blinked, "HOLY SHITAKI MUSHROOMS!' I shouted, falling backwards out of my chair.

'Is everything okay, Ruby?" Ms. Anderson asked.

"Yeah!" I said, "Everything's fine m'am!"

Ms. Anderson turned back to the rest of the class and continued what she was saying. I didn't hear a single word of it though. It was pretty clear from who had just enrolled in our school that crap was about to go DOWN in Ms. Anderson's eighth grade class.


	6. Middle School of Insanity Part 1

**I have returned! It's taken me a few days to post on this again because I've been working on something else lately, plus I've been trying to think of ideas but for some reason the only ideas I could come up with took place during what I plan to be the second arc of the story. Anyway, now I'm back and I plan to write out the new chapter now.**

** Disclaimer: If I owned Legend of Zelda I wouldn't be broke right now, would I?**

**Chapter 6: Middle School of Insanity Part 1**

The five boys stood before the class, all dressed in the school uniform. Four had blond hair and the last one had hair so black that it almost looked dark purpleish blue when the light hit it.

"As I was saying before people and chairs began falling over," Ms. Anderson continued, "These are our new students. I ask that you all treat them with respect and make an effort to help them get along as best they can during their first few days with us."

"Wow, five new kids all in one day," Dakota said, "Do you think they're brothers?"

"If they are the one on the far right obviously dyed his hair black," Ginger said, "Can't say I blame him. I think I'd get sick of staring at four people who looked EXACTLY like me too and I'd definitely have to make a change."

"Why don't you introduce yourselves to us?" Ms. Anderson said, "Tell us a bit about you. What are your interests?"

I didn't have to hear their answers to know what they were going to say. ANYONE who read the Zelda manga would know the answers. Thankfully, all the girls seem to be more interested in filing their nails or whatever and the guys are well… athletes who only seem to talk about football.

The one closest to the teacher looked at her. "Do we have to?" he asked, "There's a ton of people here and we're… kinda nervous."

_That must be Red._ I thought, judging from the tone of voice he used.

"Of course," Ms. Anderson said, "You don't have to if you don't want to."

I sighed and ran my hand through my hair. Oh boy, this was gonna be one heck of a ride.

**(Page break thingy goes here)**

The four Links, or Jack (Green), Alex (Vio), Chris (Red), Logan (Blue), and Patrick (Shadow) were apparently posing as new students at our middle school for god knows what reason. It wouldn't have been so bad though, if they weren't completely ignorant to the customs of the modern world.

At our school there's one room divided into two classes by the book shelves. The eighth graders had math on one side while the seventh graders did the same on the other. Then later in the day science and health was on one side and social studies and english were on the other side. At the present time Alex, Logan, and Patrick (Vio, Blue, and Shadow) were with me for math.

"Alright everyone, turn to page two hundred seventy five in your books and we'll pick up where we stopped yesterday," Ms. Anderson said.

"M'am," Vio said raising his hand, "The three of us don't have books!"

"Oh, I'm sorry, Alex!" she said, "Is anyone willing to share a book until I can get them their own?"

"I'll share with Patrick!" Serena said, looking in his direction and batting her eyes.

"Great!" Shadow said sarcastically, unwillingly walking over to share the book.

"I guess I could share with Alex, if he wants," I offered, as weird as this situation was, I was a MAJOR Shadow Link and Vio fan, and since Shadow already had a partner, there was no WAY I was going to wait around and let some love-sick prep share a book with Vio as well. The poor guy would probably DIE if he had some girl clinging all over him.

He silently walked over, seeming uncertain, though he had met me before. He was probably just hoping I wasn't some ditz who would murder his brain cells.

"Ginger, could you share with Logan?" Ms. Anderson asked.

"O-kay," she hesitated.

"Can I sharpen my pencil before we start?" Vio asked.

Ms. Anderson nodded and Vio went off to the electric pencil sharpener. It wasn't five seconds later that everyone jumped at the sound of the sharpener followed by a sharp yell of surprise.

Everyone's head jerked in Vio's direction. He was hovering back about three feet away from the sharpener.

"I-is that supposed to do that?" he stammered, looking at the sharpener in surprise.

"Is the ELECRIC pencil sharpener supposed to make noise?" a girl named Carrie asked, "uh, yeah!"

Shadow face palmed. "I have to go get a pencil out of my cubby, "he said, getting up and walking out of the room.

"I have to use the bathroom," I said, getting up and walking out after him.

**(page break thingy goes here)**

Shadow was stooped over, retrieving something from his cubby. As soon as he stood up I was leaning against the wall right in front of him.

"Hi," I greeted him, "How's it going?"

"Okay," he said flatly, turning to walk back inside, "I have to get back to class."

I grabbed his arm before he could go any further and began walking in the opposite direction.

"Hey!" he shouted.

"Oh, you don't need to get back right away," I said, "Let's take a walk first!"

"I really-" he began.

"Come on, let's go for a walk!" I said, ducking into the art room, which was empty since the teacher hadn't arrived yet.

I shoved him in and shut the door behind us, making sure the lock clicked into place before I turned to face him.

"What?" he asked, giving me a teasing grin, "You wanted to get me alone because you think I'm cute?"

I rolled my eyes. "Oh get OVER yourself!" I said, "Don't think I don't know who you are, Shadow Link!"

"Who?" he asked.

"Don't play dumb!"

"Who?"

"If you don't stop doing that, I swear, I'm gonna open those blinds!" I threatened, pointing to the blinds.

"And?" he asked, "Just what do you think will happen if you open those blinds?"

I didn't answer as I walked over to the window. I turned with my hand on the cord to open the window, searching his face for a sign of panic or anything else that would give him away, but he just stood there with that smirk on his face.

I rolled my eyes and yanked the cord. Sunlight streamed in through the open window and fell on Shadow's face. Nothing happened, no fading out no running away, nothing. He just stood there smiling.

"Ow!" he said, "That's bright!"

I stood there with a confused look on my face. "H-how?" I stammered.

"Strong magical protections," he stated simply.

"So I was right!" I shouted.

"Quite an observer aren't you?" he asked, that annoying smirk still plastered to his face.

"Psh," I snorted, "You and the your four friends need to work on your disguises quite a bit."

"Don't call them that!" he scowled, crossing his arms over his chest, "I don't care for them a bit! The only reason I'm doing this is the fact that I prefer this over the alternative consequence."

"Which is?" I asked.

"Nothing you need to worry yourself with at the moment," he said, "Be glad that bringing a sword to a school would arouse suspicion. If I had it with me I'd run you through, you and your irritating questions. I care less for your human race than I do for those four fools!"

"But didn't you-" I stopped before I could quiz him about the ending events of the manga and clamped my hand over my mouth.

_Oh my god!_ I thought, _If he still has this attitude and that dark personality of his, then that must mean they didn't conclude the story before coming here, however they managed that!_

"Were you saying something, human?" he asked, boredly examining the sleeve of his shirt.

"Nothing," I said, relieved that he hadn't been listening.

"Doesn't matter anyway," he said, "probably more of your stupid babbling." He turned and unlocked the door, "now if you'll excuse me, I seem to be late for class."

Shadow closed the door behind him, leaving me in the deserted art room with a idiotic expression. _This is a wonderful situation you've gotten yourself into, Ruby Dixon!_ I snapped at myself in my head, _You almost get stabbed by a ticked off demon, the Four Swords Links are at your school for god-knows-what-reason, oh yeah, and to make things better, Shadow's still a twisted, semi-evil jerk with major jealousy issues! This is going to be the school day from Hades!_

**(page break thingy goes here)**

Thankfully my little misadventure in the art room cost me most of math class so I didn't have to sit through what I was certain would have been a rather painful experience, especially with Blue in my class.

"Hey!" Green said, walking over to me, "do you know which group I'm in? I don't know which class I'm in next."

After math everyone is in one of three groups. Every week a group either has art, music, or PE, and the groups switch every week so we have something different. I walked up to the bulletin board where the list was posted and looked it over. My eyes settled on the name "Jack."

"Oh yeah it looks like you have PE!" I said, "I have that class too, want to walk with me out to the field?" I asked, hoping that if I confronted Green I'd be able to get more information out of him than I did Shadow.

"Sure, that'd be cool!" he said.

"Could you wait for me by the door?" I asked, "I have to tie my boot." I said, using it as an excuse to see if any more of my video game character "friends" had found their way into the group.

"Sure," he said, walking towards the door.

I almost immediately jumped up and nearly ripped the list into pieces in my frantic attempt to get at it.

"Oh great!" I groaned, looking at it.

"Something wrong?" Green called.

"No nothing!" I smiled, "I'm coming!"

I tramped towards the door, mentally groaning all the way. This was just great! Sometimes when our music teacher didn't have anything scheduled for the day she'd let the Music Group come out for PE. Unfortunately, that was what she was doing today and to make thing worse, those Links that weren't in PE were in music.

I was now officially stuck with all five of them.

**(page break thingy goes here)**

Dodge Ball. Of all the games in the world I could get stuck playing with one overly aggressive person, one overly sensitive person, one person who never failed to get ticked at the aggressive person, and one person with a visible evil streak, it just HAD to be dodge ball. Vio I really wasn't too worried about though, at least there was one person it that group of maniacs who was actually CALM!

Thank GOD the school had passed a rule that we had to use Gator Skin balls. God forbid one of them threw an actual dodge ball at me!

The game started out in a pretty friendly fashion and kept going that way, and then the calm before the storm ended.

"You JERK!" Green shouted, "You MEANT to do that!"

"And what if I did?" Blue retorted, gesturing to the Gator Skin ball that had hit Green in the face only moments before, "It's not exactly every day someone provides me with ammo to hit you in the face!"

"THAT'S IT!" Green shouted, snatching the ball up and lobbing it at Blue.

"Hey, watch it!" one of my class mates shouted when the ball missed its mark and hit him instead. He picked up the ball and threw it at Green, it was much to his embarrassment that it hit Shadow instead.

"Oh you asked for it!" he shouted, "You insolent fool!"

"What did you just call me?" the outraged boy shouted.

"I called you a FOOL!" Shadow screamed, sending the ball flying in his direction.

"S-stop it!" Red shouted, breaking down in tears when the ball hit him.

"That's enough!" Green called, storming over to Shadow, "Apologize!" he demanded.

"And if I don't?" Shadow asked.

"You are SUCH a jerk!" Green raged, "If you were going to act like this why did you even come with us? Huh? Why don't you go back to your "master?"

Shadow looked downright dangerous at that moment. I half expected him to start zapping random people off to the Dark Realm or something. Shadow had a look on his face like he was trying to choke down a golf ball, then he pulled his arm back and punched Green right smack in the face.

"Don't you EVER say that to me again!" he roared.

Green wiped a bit of blood off of his lip before taking a swing at Shadow and it wasn't long until we had a full on fight on our hands and a crowd gathered to watch the scene.

"Enough you two!" the coach said, dragging them away from each other with the help of one of the older boys in the class, "I can't believe you two!" he ranted, "Keep an eye on them," he told the other boy, "I'm going to see what the head of the school has to say about this!"


	7. Middle School of Insanity Part 2

**I have nothing to say at the moment so shall we just get on with it?**

**Disclaimer: I don't own anything, if you thought I did own Zelda, stay right where you are while I call the men in the white coats.**

**Chapter 7: Middle School of Insanity Part 2**

"This behavior is completely unacceptable!" I saw Green wince as Mr. Jenkins slam the stack of papers he was holding down on his desk, "And on your FIRST day? I must say, I am INCREDIBLY disappointed in you boys!"

"But sir, we-" Green began.

"I don't want to hear any of it!" the head of the school shouted, "What are your parent's numbers? We have so much to discuss, as a matter of fact I think we'll just talk and talk and talk all day long!"

"I'm sorry," someone behind me said, "Jack is staying with me and Patrick is staying with Ruby until their parents can find an apartment."

"Oh, well in that case, Ruby, I'll talk to your parents about this," he looked at the other person, "And what's your name?"

Lya strolled into the room. "Lya," she said, "I'm Dakota's cousin. You can call her parents to pick Jack up, sir."

"Okay then," Mr. Jenkins said, picking up the phone on his desk, "You two," he said, pointing at Shadow and Green, "Out of my office! Wait outside until I'm done!"

Shadow and Green moodily trudged out of the office with Lya and I following.

"Come here," I said to Lya, pulling her into an empty meeting room and shutting the door so we couldn't be over heard.

"I guess you want to know how I knew to come here?" she asked.

"You're darn right I do!" I said, trying to keep the slight spaz-out I was having out of my voice, "and would you also explain why Shadow is going home with ME?"

"Just calm down, would you?" she said, placing her hands on my shoulders.

"I am calm!" I said, "I'm perfectly calm! I'm just a bit confused about what I'm going to say to my parents when they get called to pick up a total stranger!"

"Sit down," she said, pulling an incredibly small chair that was meant for a kindergartener out of the corner, "Slow down and just take it from the top."

I took a deep breath. "Fine, I'll take it from the top," I said, "Why are you here and how did you find out about this?"

"Dakota called me on her cell to tell me what was going on," Lya explained.

"But I thought you'd never played the old games!" I accused.

"She also showed me your manga," Lya said, "You never took that thing out of your bag apparently."

"So my best friend filled you in by riffling through my personal belongings?" I sighed, "Who said she could go in my bag?"

"When this kind of this pops up, I really don't think it matters whether or not she goes through your stuff," Lya said.

I sighed. "I know," I groaned, "I know! I'm just severely spazzing out and my mouth feels like I just swallowed a cup full of sand, and oh my GOD, I need water!"

"Just calm down and I'll help you come up with a story for your parents," she said.

"Oh, like it's really that simple!" I said, "I live in a six room house, you know! We have two bedrooms and definitely NOT enough space for that little psychopath to stay with us!"

"He can sleep on your couch," Lya suggested.

"Well, if this conversation isn't awkward then I don't know what is!" I cried.

"Just use the same story I used on your principle," she said, "Your parents might me ticked that you didn't ask first, but at least you won't have to go through the whole 'this is Shadow Link! He's from a fictional land!' thing!"

"Right, right!" I said, "I'd better start getting used to being deprived of my Wii, because I have a feeling that I'm not going to be seeing it for a LONG time."

**(page break thingy goes here)**

My mom arrived about forty minutes later to see what the heck was going on with this whole thing.

"Ruby," she said, "just what is going on here?"

"Well, you see," I said, laughing nervously, "U-um, Patrick needs to stay with us."

"And just why is that?" she asked, "the last time I checked we didn't have room for another person to stay over."

"W-well," I continued, "his parents are trying to find an apartment," I explained, "Come on mom! He can have my room! He has like, four brothers, so how are their parents gonna get them all a hotel room? They're almost broke!"

"Fine," my mom said, her expression becoming a bit more understanding when she saw Shadow, "but ONLY until his parents find an apartment. Do you understand, young lady?"

I nodded. "Yes m'am! I do!"

"Come to the car with me, Patrick," she said, "I don't have time to go home today so I'm afraid you'll have to come around town with me while I do my errands."

"Yes m'am," he said politely.

I snorted and leaned over. "Quite an actor, aren't you?" I whispered.

"Shut up," he growled, following my mom to the car.

"Have fun!" I said, waving to him.

Shadow Link scowled and slammed the car door. "I seriously hope you got your finger caught in that door," I muttered as my mom pulled out of the parking lot.

**(page break thingy goes here)**

Lya had convinced Dakota's parents to let Green stay with them and, let me be blunt folks, I was jealous. They had a very mild mannered, polite, and helpful Link staying with them, two of them actually since she had convinced them to take Vio in for a while as well. And I was taking home a violent, temperamental, slightly evil S.O.B. with a jealousy complex. Man, life isn't FAIR!

The remaining Links and the "normal" people who actually knew and gave a care what the heck was going on gathered back in the woods during recess to discuss what to do with Blue and Red.

"Send us where ever you want," Blue griped, "I don't care! Just as long as the person I stay with doesn't tick me off, I'm fine!"

"Everyone ticks you off!" I said, rolling my eyes.

It only took about five seconds before he was up in my face. "WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY ABOUT ME?" he shouted, "ARE YOU TRYIN' TO PICK A FIGHT, KID?"

"Would you just calm down?" Vio asked, "Nobody challenged you so don't turn this into something it's not."

"ARE YOU ACCUSING ME OF BEING OVER DRAMATIC?" Blue demanded, "Don't tell me I'm going to stay with YOU!"

"No way in Hades!" I exclaimed, "I already have one impossible to get along with kid staying with me! I do NOT need another!"

"I feel bad for you," Red said, "You got stuck with Shadow."

"I feel bad for me too, Red," I said.

"I hope you don't get hurt," he said, "If you did I think- I-I think I'd… c-cry!" He then burst into tears.

"Aw, come on, man!" Kevin said, "Don't worry! Have a Twix!"

Red smiled a bit and took the candy bar from Kevin. "What is it?" he asked.

"It's CANDY!" Kevin cheered, taking another Twix out of his pocket and shoving the entire thing in his mouth.

"I think we've found a match," Dakota said, pointing to Kevin and Red.

"I don't have any objections to that!" Kevin said, "He's cool!"

"I'M COOL?" Red asked through a mouthful of candy.

"Yes," Kevin said, "Yes you are."

Ginger looked thoughtful. "So if Ruby has the black-haired guy, Dakota has the guy who's always reading and the other guy who got sent home, and Kevin has the little guy, then doesn't that leave me with…"

She and Blue looked at each other. "OH HECK NO!" they both shouted at the same time.

**So that's it for this chapter. The next chapter I plan to have some explanation as to what's going on, and of course, RANDOM INSANITY! But for now, this is it folks! Please leave a review on your way out.**


	8. Homeward Bound Insanity

**GAH! Sorry peoples! I couldn't even think about this chapter until I finished my Social Studies project. I apologize for it taking so long. We had to make an alphabet book for the American Revolution and well, YOU try to find a word that starts with "X"! It's not easy, I tell you! **

**Link: excuses.**

**Silver: I AM NOT!**

**Disclaimer: If I owned Legend of Zelda, I would make this fanfic into a video game.**

**Chapter 8: Homeward Bound Insanity**

It was (finally) the end of the endless day and we were all waiting to be dismissed. I wanted to breath a sigh of relief but I couldn't because lord only knew what would be waiting for me when I got home.

"Alright," Ms. Anderson said, "I feel like having a student select how we dismiss today. Now who should I choose?"

I raised my hand. "I think either Logan or Chris should do it!"

Oh my god, a chance to put Blue on the spot! This was too good to pass up! Ginger snickered and leaned over.

"Nice one," she whispered, "he totally deserves it!"

"Ginger and Ruby!" Ms. Anderson warned, "Do I have to separate you two?"

"No m'am!" we both said at the same time.

"Then show me that the two of you have the ability to pay attention!" she said.

"Yes m'am," we replied.

"I agree with Ruby," Ginger said, "I think Logan should do it!"

Blue looked at Ms. Anderson. "Uh, what the heck am I supposed to do?"

"Just dismiss people in some way, she explained, "Like, if you have on black shoes you can leave or something."

"Just don't make us dance!" one person called, obviously recalling the time that Ms. Anderson had made us dance out of the classroom.

Blue got a look on his face that said, "this is stupid," then he heaved a sigh. "Let's go home!" he said plainly.

"YEAH!" everyone agreed before making for the door like an avalanche

of people.

"Rats!" Ginger said, before following Blue out of the room. I'm sorry to say, I didn't feel one bit sorry for her because I was too busy worrying about my own situation.

**(Page break thingy goes here)**

I got into the car and slammed the door behind me.

"Hey," my mom said, "how was your day?"

"Normal," I said flatly, buckling my seat belt and leaning over towards Shadow, "You're in my spot!" I whispered.

"Deal with it," he snorted, "I'm not moving for you!"

I heaved a sigh of defeat. Had my mom not been there I would have shoved his butt out of that seat for being such a jerk about it. Unfortunately, I couldn't exactly do that without raising suspicion (or being grounded.) Instead I took my little, red MP3 player out and turned it up as loud as I could stand it.

Shadow looked at me curiously. "What's that?" he asked.

"It's an MBP," my mom replied.

"An MP3, mom!" I corrected.

"Okay," she said defensively, "Sorry, techno girl!"

"What's it do?" Shadow asked, obviously becoming more and more interested in the MP3.

"Blast tunes," I said, deliberately phrasing it in a way that would confuse him so he would hopefully leave me alone about it.

"She means it plays music," mom explained.

_Thank you mother._ I thought, upset that now he was going to bother me about THAT now as well.

"I don't hear anything," he snorted, "it must be broken or something!"

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah it's broken," I said, attempting to end the conversation.

"Ruby!" my mom scolded, "Tell him how it works. You and I both know that the MBP isn't broken."

"Mp THREE!" I corrected, "Ugh, fine!" I snorted in disgust before turning to Shadow, "You turn it on then the sound comes out here," I jabbed my finger at the headphones, "then nobody can't hear it but- HEY!" I shouted as he removed my headphones.

"Ruby," my mom warned again, "let him try it out."

"Yes m'am," I said moodily, "It's not like he'll be able to understand the artists," I muttered under my breath.

"What is this crap?" Shadow asked right on cue. Though, I hadn't been expecting to use the term "crap" to describe my music.

"It's NOT crap!" I exploded, "I'll have you know that this music is some of Japan's most popular pop music!"

Shadow rolled his eyes. "You want me to like it?" he whispered, "then play me something in a language that I can understand!"

"You are such and arrogant, idiotic, jerk!" I whispered back angrily, "I'll do nothing of the kind. In fact keep your hands off my stuff!" I snatched the headphones away from him, "He's done, mom!" I told her.

**(Page break thingy goes here)**

I watched my mom walk away towards the house. When she was gone, I flung open Shadow's door.

"Get out!" I ordered.

Shadow swung one leg out of the car and then the other, his boots hitting the ground with a soft THUMP. He surveyed the area outside the car, looking over the garage, trees, driveway, and house. He visibly grimaced when he saw all the cats walking about and waiting to be fed.

"Darn furry creatures!" he muttered, "I hate cats!"

I glared at him. "You do anything to my cats, and I'll break your face, got it?"

He muttered something that sounded like, "I'd like to see you try," but he didn't attempt to push the argument anymore. That may be attributed to the fact that he thought I really might try to break his face. I smirked as he slung his bag over his shoulder and headed for the house.

"Looks like I finally wore that mouth of his down, the jerk," I mumbled to myself before following him to the door.

**(Page break thingy goes here)**

It came as no surprise to me when I walked into my room and saw Shadow sitting on my bed giving me a this-is-my-room-now-get-out look. I rolled my eyes.

"You can have the freakin' room while you're staying here!" I snapped, "Just gimme my anime! I'm gonna take it in the living room so I can avoid you as much as possible!" I grabbed several volumes of Dragon Ball Z, Samurai Deeper Kyo, Fullmetal Alchemist, and Rorouni Kenshin off the shelf below the TV and stormed over to the door.

"Don't like sharing your anime much, do you?" he mumbled.

"Puh-lease!" I snorted, "I'm an only child. It's not my fault if I'm not used to people poking around my stuff!" I doubled back, "I forgot the InuYasha and I'll be DARNED if I have to come in here and get in a big fight with you over those!"

"Just get your Inyu-Asha and get out!" he snapped, "I need to change!"

"Whoa, whoa there!" I said, "Just what are you changing into?"

"Clothes," he said flatly.

I snatched his bag off the bed and began pawing through it, despite his protests. Finally, I reached to the bottom and pulled out a familiar black tunic and hat.

"Uh, no!" I said, "You can NOT put this back on!"

He grabbed at the tunic. "There's nothing WRONG with it!" Shadow shouted.

"It's weird and outdated!" I argued back, "And you'll be recognized by people for miles around!"

"What I wear is my own business!" he snarled, "I wouldn't be caught DEAD in half of the clothes in this room!"

"Well of course you wouldn't!" I snapped, "They're GIRL'S clothes!"

"Well, if they're all girl's clothes then give me my freaking tunic back!" he demanded, "I don't have anything else to wear except this stupid school uniform!"

I opened a drawer and took a Samurai Deeper Kyo T-shirt out, then tossed it to him.

"Fine, you want a guy's shirt? There's a guy's shirt!" I barked, "put that on and wear your school pants! We're going to Wal-Mart!"

I stomped out and then backed back into the room. "And it's INUYASHA!" I shouted, "God, you're worse than my dad!"

**(Page break thingy goes here)**

"You wear male clothes?" Shadow asked, stomping into the kitchen with my Kyo T-shirt on.

"Yeah," I answered, "Why, you got a problem?"

"You're really weird," Shadow accused.

"Thank you!" I said, determined not to let anything else he said bother me today.

"It wasn't meant as a compliment," he growled.

"Oh, I know," I nodded.

"What the-" a car horn blared outside, cutting him off. Good thing too, the feeling of zen I was acquiring towards him was starting to wear thin.

"What was that?" Shadow shouted, "We're under attack!" He hit the floor.

I sighed. "It's just Kevin. I invited him to come with us."

"As entertainment?" Shadow smirked.

"Protection," I replied, shooting him an accusing glance before walking out the door.

**(Page break thingy goes here)**

Shadow walked out to the car and perched himself on the hood while Kevin's mom gave him and "What the freak" look from the other side of the windshield.

The backseat window on the shotgun side rolled down and a head popped out.

"Hey, Ruby!" Red shouted, "We're going to Wal-Mart!"

"Hey, Chris!" I said, "I know! We're going too!"

I reached out and ruffled his hair. Hey, don't blame me! If Red started talking and being all cute to you, wouldn't you be tempted to do the same thing?

"Hey!" Kevin shouted, sticking his head out the front seat window, "me too!"

"Okay Kevin," I said. I reached over like I was going to ruffle his hair and thunked him on the forehead when he leaned forward.

Kevin faked falling backwards in slow motion and then bolted straight up. "That was highly painful!" he announced, looking out the front windshield at Shadow, who was still sitting on the hood, "So, what're we gonna do about the emo kid sitting on the hood?"

"Kevin!" his mom scolded.

"What?" Kevin asked.

I had a mental flashback of what had taken place a few moments previously and felt an evil grin creep onto my face. I nodded towards the horn.

Kevin reached out and honked the horn for about three seconds, effectively scaring the living crap out of Shadow.

"AGH!" he shouted, vaulting off of the hood of the car, "You," he spat, "will pay for that later!"

"Sorry, I'm broke!" I announced, "Now get your butt in the mini van!"

Shadow moodily climbed into the van and slammed the door behind him.

"Alright!" Kevin shouted, "Let's get this party STARTED!" He burst into song, "I'm on the road again! Just can't wait to get on the road again!"

I sang along while Red clapped to the tune because he didn't know the words.

Kevin suddenly stopped singing. "TO THE DOCK TO PICK UP THAT ILLEGAL SHIPMENT OF C4 I ORDERED!" he shouted, pointing ahead, "THEN TO WAL-MART TO BLOW IT UP IN TIME TO OUR SINGING!" he wildly waved his arms.

"I think Wal-Mart's that way," I said, pointing to the south.

"RIGHT!" he shouted, pointing in the same direction, "TO INFINITY AND BEYOND!"

I heard Shadow muttering to himself. "Goddess, please kill me now," he said.


	9. How WalMart Was Trashed

**TO THE DOCK TO PICK UP THAT ILLEGAL SHIPMENT OF C4 I ORDERED! ONWARD TO THE FIC!**

**Disclaimer: Only own my four OC's. Zelda belongs to Nintendo and Lya belongs to Piezelle. I wouldn't have time to develop new games if I did own it because of school and the fact that I'm too busy going to the dock with my friend to pick up illegal shipments of C4.**

**Chapter 9: How Wal-Mart Was Trashed**

It was clear that Red and Shadow had never seen a store this large before. As soon as we stepped out of the car their eyes nearly doubled in size.

"Earth to Chris and Patrick!" I said, waving my hand in front of their faces and using every bit of my concentration to avoid slipping and calling them "Red and Shadow."

Red blinked his eyes rapidly and looked up at me. "Everything's so BIG!" I shouted, jumping up in the air.

Kevin laughed and patted his shoulder. "Chill out, man," he said, "We've got lots of time to look around."

Kevin's mom looked at us. "I've got to do some errands," she announced, "I think I can trust you four to look after yourselves. You ARE old enough that I can trust you to be here when I get back, right?"

"Yes m'am," we all nodded.

"Kevin has a phone and my number," she informed us, "call if you need anything."

"Okay," I said as she shut the door and sped away.

_Oh boy, _I thought sarcastically, _This is the calm, but as soon as one of them gets out of our sight, the storm begins._

**(Page break thingy goes here)**

"You DO have your phone right?" I asked nervously.

"No," Kevin said defensively, grabbing his phone, "I have a detonator for all the explosives I'm about to plant!"

"He has his phone," I told Shadow and Red.

"My precioussssssss," he hissed, hugging the cell phone.

"Alright!" Red shouted, "We're gonna go to Wal-Mart!" he ran at the door with his arms out. I knew that he was planning to push it open.

"Wait, don't push it! Its—" A loud WUMPH and cut me off. I winced and opened my eyes to see Red, who had fallen face first onto the floor, "—automatic," I finished.

"Ouch!" Red shouted, jumping to his feet and whirling around to face the door, "It's h-haunted!" he shouted, pointing at it and starting to tear up.

"No it isn't," I told him, stepping in front of the door and causing it to open again.

"Ahh!" he shouted in alarm, "T-there's a Poe possessing it! Get away from there!" he shouted.

"It's just this awesome thing we call technology, dude!" Kevin exclaimed.

"T-technology?" Red asked.

"See that little thing up there?" I asked, pointing to the motion sensor, "That little thing senses motion."

"The p-poe's in there?" Red stammered.

"Ha!" Shadow shouted, running up to the door, "Poe," he ordered, "I demand that you show yourself at once!"

Silence.

"You DARE defy ME?" he roared.

Awkward silence.

"As I was SAYING!" I growled at Shadow, "It's like a camera that senses where you are. Then when you get in the right spot, the door opens for you."

"Camera?" Red asked.

"Pictobox," I corrected myself.

"Oh!" Red nodded, "I see now! It's not haunted after all!"

"Right," Kevin said, "Now, dude, come on! Wal-Mart awaits!"

**(Page break thingy goes here)**

"First things first guys!" I ordered, "We're gonna get you two some normal modern clothes to wear. Then we can run around and be crazy."

"Can I hide in clothes racks and throw Skittles at people while yelling 'TASTE THE RAINBOW' until we get kicked out?" Kevin asked.

"After we pay," I told him, "Otherwise the clothes shopping would be a waste of time."

"Okay…" he said sadly.

"And only if I can help!" I added.

"OKAY!" he shouted.

"Can we find some clothes that are not completely ridiculous?" Shadow complained.

"Oh," I said, "Now I KNOW you aren't talking about—"

Shadow pointed to the Kyo T-shirt. I smacked him with my purse causing him to shout with surprise.

"Respect the demon!" I shouted, "Respect him!"

A couple of passers-by gave us weird looks and went about their business in a hurried fashion. I blushed and looked down at my shoes, embarrassed.

"You do realize they were looking at you and not C4 boy, right?" Shadow asked.

"Yup," I squeaked, "I know!"

**(Page break thingy goes here)**

"Okay troops!" I announced, gesturing to the section of clothes behind me, "Go pick some stuff out. Just be careful 'Patrick.' My price range is twenty bucks then I'm broke."

"Bucks?" Shadow inquired, pawing through the racks.

"Rupees," I growled in an exasperated tone.

"You're cheap," he accused, pulling a black shirt out of the jumble.

"I have a crappy allowance!" I argued, "And get some pants! You are NOT wearing my jeans!"

"Please," he snorted, "Like I would wear ANYTHING that belongs to you."

Kevin gestured to the shirt with a smirk. "Ruby's Samurai Deeper Kyo shirt is arguing against that statement and winning."

Shadow scowled. "Unless I was desperate," he corrected.

"That's your shirt?" Red asked, stepping out of a clothing rack with a red shirt that had a white cat on it and read "save the planet! It's the only one with kittens!" Don't ask me what the h-e-double hockey sticks that was doing in a BOYS section but hey, you've gotta admit it would look right on Red.

"Yes," I answered, "and it misses me desperately!"

"I didn't ASK for you to lend me your stupid shirt!" Shadow shouted.

It was then that half the store turned to stare at us. I gave a low whistle. "You mind keeping it down, Patrick?"

"Make me!" he growled.

"Be nice!" Red scolded.

"I'll be nice when I feel like it!" Shadow barked, "And get rid of that shirt! It's too girly!"

"This shirt isn't girly!" Red started to cry.

"Shut up!" Shadow shouted, "All of you!"

"I'm not going to shut up!" I argued, "You're living in my house, you haven't had the courtesy to tell me why you're here or what the heck's going on, and currently, you're wearing my shirt! You have NO right to tell me to shut up!"

"All of you SHUT UP!" he snarled dangerously, "SHUT UP!"

"Screw you and your shadow magic!" I said, swatting at a shadowy tendril that obviously meant that he had either lost control of his own magic for a moment, or he was seriously thinking about killing someone. Either way, it was bad news.

"I'D BE BETTER OFF IF ALL OF YOU WOULD JUST SHUT UP AND LET ME THINK FOR A FREAKING SECOND!" He shouted at the top of his lungs.

"Shadow calm down!" I shouted, "Are you trying to kill us?"

"Maybe I AM!" he shouted.

The entire room was suddenly enveloped in shadows. For a second I couldn't even see my hand in front of my face. Then it cleared up as suddenly as it came.

Clothes and racks lay scattered everywhere. A few people were just climbing to their feet after being knocked over. A confused murmur rippled through the crowds.

"What happened? Did the store blow a fuse? I KNEW I shouldn't have watched Paranormal Activity last night!"

I looked around in a panic. Fortunately, nobody seemed hurt after that, which was a miracle in itself.

I turned to Kevin. "Get your mom on the phone, then call Ginger," I ordered, "It's time these five clowns gave us some answers."


	10. The Arguements Before the Talk

** Okay I know I'm late, I know you're ticked, I know you're probably pointing guns at my screen name and shouting DIE! But I'm back with a new chapter… and tacos… so please don't shoot!**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing besides my OCs and my insanity.**

**Chapter 10: The Argument's Before the Talk**

Shadow and I stood rather awkwardly outside Dakota's house. Everyone else had said their hellos and gone inside, but not us. We were still arguing about Shadow's earlier outburst and Ginger had refused to let us come inside.

"Sit your sorry buts down on that step and make up!" she had snapped, "I for one refuse to walk in that house and feel completely uncomfortable with you two biting each other's heads off!"

So, here we were, awkwardly standing, as I mentioned before. More took place during a DBZ filler than was taking place now, that's how uneventful it was.

"Ginger says we need to make up," I growled, shooting Shadow an annoyed glance.

He snorted. "Don't care."

I stood up and roughly yanked Shadow to his feet. "Now you listen here!" I snarled, "I've had it up to here with you!"

I almost expected the bunch of spectators inside the house would rush out to see what all the commotion was about. When nobody did (obviously unable to hear us over the PS3 and blaring Linkin Park music) I continued my rant. "I will not stay out here with YOU for another second! It's hot, it's miserable, I'm ticked as heck, and I want to punch you in the nose!" I pointed at him, "We are going inside and there will be no smug comments, no breaking things that aren't yours, no "to the dark realm with you" or whatever the h-e-double hockey sticks it is you say! Basically, if you do it normally on a daily basis, don't do it!" I took a breath "I want you to leave my best friend's house just the way you found it, in one piece!"

Shadow gritted his teeth. "Watch where you point that finger," he threatened, "you might lose it."

Oh, I LOST it all right! Right there and then, on my best friend's front step, I slapped Shadow Link across the face as hard as humanly possible. And let me tell you this folks, it felt pretty darn good.

"OW!" he shouted, putting one hand on the side of his face and stumbling back a few steps.

"That's IT!" I shouted, "Say that again, I DARE you!"

Shadow scowled. "Oh, you DARE me, huh?" he advanced until his face was so close to mine, we almost touched noses, "Watch where you point that finger, you little w-"

I slapped him again. Shadow's lips pulled back into a snarl that rivaled that of a rabid dog, and if looks could kill, I think I would have died right there on that step about fifty times over. Right at that moment, some idiot cranked the stereo up, and it's pretty obvious that once you have music pounding inside your skull from OUTSIDE the building, you know that nobody's gonna come out to witness a slap fight between an evil shadow warrior and a fourteen year old kid.

"Oh, you wanna fight, huh?" I asked.

As soon as the challenge was open, Shadow flung himself at me. Now I don't know if shadow beings have some kind of Super Man speed or something or I am just REALLY slow, all I knew was that before I could do a darn thing I was on the gravel driveway with a pair of hands around my throat, the owner of which, didn't seem particularly eager to relinquish his grip.

"I'll teach you some respect!" he shouted.

My hands flew up to pry his off my throat but to no avail.

"You know, I really don't understand the point of keeping you bunch of fools safe," he continued, drawing his sword, "It would be such an easy solution to the problem if we just killed one of you instead."

"Gnh!" I gasped in alarm.

"However, that would be a bit messier than necessary," he sighed, standing up, "get up," he ordered.

"Hwa?" I asked.

"Oh, are you deaf now?" he snapped, "I told you to get up."

I sat up and dusted myself off. "Er, thank you?" I asked, somewhat confused and more than a bit relieved.

"Shut up," he growled, "I don't need your thanks. I'm going inside."

**(page break)**

I nearly had a heart attack when I entered the house and the first thing I heard was someone screaming "DIE, DIE, DIE," at the top of their lungs. At first I thought Shadow had snapped and decided to zap everyone present at the time away to the dark realm. It was much to my relief that I realized that it wasn't Shadow screaming.

"Hi, Dakota," I greeted her, the word "DIE" still coming from the next room.

"Hi," she said, looking somewhat annoyed with all the screaming.

Lya came stumbling down the stairs with her hands over here ears. "HI!" she shouted, attempting to block out the noise and carry out the conversation at the same time.

"Hey, Lya!" I greeted her.

"WHAT?" she asked.

"HEY, LYA!" I shouted, "WHAT'S UP?"

"RED SAYS THAT YOU GUYS WANTED TO GET US ALL TOGETHER FOR AN EXPLAINATION AS TO WHY THESE GUYS ARE HERE OR SOMETHING!" she yelled.

"WHO'S SHOUTING?" I asked.

Lya said nothing. Instead she simply pointing to the living room. I heaved a sigh and stomped off to locate the source of the disturbance.

Vio stomped out of the room, a book under one arm and earplugs in his pointed ears. He turned around angrily (le gasp! Is that even possible?) and pointed in the same direction Lya had. "Get him away from there," he mouthed, storming upstairs.

I cautiously opened the door. I don't know about all of you, but if I heard someone screaming "DIE, DIE, DIE" on the other side of a door, I wouldn't be real eager to enter the room.

"Yes! Yes!" Dakota's brother cheered, "Shoot that guy!"

He had apparently taught Blue how to play Call of Duty and THAT was what all the screaming was about.

"DIE YOU JERK! DIE!" Blue shouted, frantically jabbing at the buttons on the X Box controller.

"YESSSSSS!" they both shouted when the "level up" flashed onto the screen.

"You guys," I said moodily, "Logan you need to put the controller down and come on. We called this meeting for a reason!"

"Don't tell me what to do!" Blue snapped, starting a new game level, "DIE DIE DIE DIE D-HEY," he shouted as I pulled the cord out of the wall.

"Come on!" I growled, not exactly in the best mood having spent so much time being kept totally in the dark while sharing my house with a total jerk.

"Geddoff me!" Blue snarled as I dragged him into the dining room by the back of his blue Angry Birds shirt.

I shoved him into the nearest chair as fast as I could. "Where's Vio?" I sighed.

"Upstairs reading like a good boy," Ginger growled, "I was in the MIDDLE of something when you called me out here on your little emergency meeting!" she declared.

"I'll be right back," I told them, ignoring the last comment, "Watch him you six," I ordered, pointing at Blue, who made a face.

"Yeah, yeah, same to you, buddy," I grumbled.

**(line break)**

"Hey, nice hang out," I said, shutting the door behind me as I entered Vio's room (a.k.a. a section of the attic).

"Yes," he replied, his nose shoved in the book he was reading so intently, "It was very peaceful until a few moments ago."

"Yeah?" I asked, ignoring what he was trying to get at, "Great, I love peace and quiet." (which of course, was a lie).

"Hn," Vio grunted, turning a page in the book.

"The Kane Chronicles, huh?" I asked, sitting down beside him.

"Have you read this?" he asked, barely glancing up and not missing a single word on the page at the same time.

"Only three times," I said, "I don't read much."

Vio slowly set the book down and stared at me in disbelief. "You've read this THREE times and still have the nerve to tell me that you 'don't read much'?" he demanded.

"Well, what is much after all?" I shrugged.

"These 'Egyptians' in your world, they had a mythology and their own language. It's really quite fascinating to read about," the mythology is so different from the one I'm familiar with, yet similar at the same time."

"Most mythologies are like that," I shrugged, "a lot of people don't pay attention to that fact, especially kids, who hardly read anything. Are you interested in this world's mythology?" I asked, finally glad to be with someone who hopefully shared my intrest.

"Very," he nodded, "do you have a map I could look at? That would help a bit to see the countries I would be looking at."

"Well," I pulled out a laptop and pulled up a world map on Google, "You can start here."

"How's that work?" he asked, staring at the image on the screen in awe.

"I'm not entirely sure," I said, "and we'd be sitting here for years if I tried to explain what I DID know."

Vio sat down and observed the map with no further questions. He didn't touch the computer and had a look on his face that made me wonder if he thought it would bite him if he tried to do so.

He turned his head and looked at me. "I wish I was staying with you," he grumbled, "you're quiet. I wake up in the morning here and wonder if the house is falling down around me!"

"Don't I wish I could switch Shadow for you," I rolled my eyes.

"Hm, well good luck with that," he said plainly, "I don't think anyone else has the patience to take him."

"**I** don't have the patience to take him!" I grumbled, "the guy hasn't even been with me for a DAY and I already want to shove him off a cliff!"

"Can't say I blame you," Vio said, "How do I input a search?"

"He's a crap hole," I muttered, typing in Vio's search topic for him.

"Hn, an interesting way of describing him," he stated absently, skimming over an article on Japan, "Interesting."

I was about to reply when someone outside the room called me, and not very politely, I might add. "Listen here, wench! The losers downstairs wanted me to come and get you! Just get the idiot and come down to the meeting. The meeting that YOU called!"

I shook my fist at the door. "SHUT UP, DUMB BUTT! I'LL BE THERE WHEN I GET THERE AND IF YOU HAVE A PROBLEM THEN GO CRY TO VAATI OR SOMETHIN'!"

Vio winced at the sudden raise of volume but continued what he was doing.

The door opened and Shadow stormed in a huff, apparently not at all happy with me calling him a "dumb butt."

"I'm afraid you misunderstand," he said, grabbing the back of my sweater and dragging me out the door, "I'm not ASKING you to come. I'm TELLING you!"

Only two words can describe what that experience was like, and they are CARPET BUUUUUURN! DX

"SAVE ME!" I shouted to Vio, attempting to free my arms from the sleeves of the jacket as I was dragged towards the meeting place against my will.

**(line break)**

Have you ever tripped and fallen down a flight of stairs? If you have I'm sorry, but if you multiply that times ten, you still won't even be close to the amount of embarrassment that comes from having someone DRAG you down a flight of stairs.

"Ow! Ow! Ow! OW DARN IT!" I shouted as I slid down the stairs behind Shadow, "ARE YOU ENJOYING THIS?"

"Somewhat," he replied with a smirk.

I heard a poorly held back snicker as we approached the bottom of the stairs. "SHUT UP RANDOM PERSON!" I shouted.

That helped a lot, said person burst out laughing at my situation, I then realized it was Dakota.

"Hey Ruby!" she snickered, "Did you have a nice trip?"

"That's lame!" I answered, "First off, I didn't trip and second off, it is a LONG way down your freakin' stairs!"

Dakota simply stared, unfazed. "So it was a short trip?" she answered at last.

"Can we PLEASE get serious for a MINUTE?" Ginger demanded, "I don't know about anyone else but I for one would like to know how THIS clown got here and how long I'm gonna be stuck with him!"

"Touché," I grumbled, irritated with Shadows latest episode.

"I wouldn't advise that," Vio said, appearing at the bottom of the stairs, "Or at least not here. The less people there are in an area, the better the chance of us being overheard. We should talk in a crowded place."

Ginger glanced around. "I don't see anyone," she replied.

"Just because you can't see anyone doesn't mean anything," Vio sighed, "Where's the loudest place in town?"

I thought for a moment. "Get your stuff together gang," I said, "We're going skating."

"YEEEEESSSSS!" Kevin shouted, pumping his fists in the air.

I walked to the phone to call everyone's parents and let them know where we were headed.

"Oh and Vio," I said, turning around.

"Yes?" he asked, raising and eyebrow.

"I'm getting my tape recorder, remember that last question you asked."

**I would like to thank that anonymous reviewer with his or her advice for my theme park. I don't really get to go to parks often so it will be a big help in later chapters when the park comes back into play. **

** Also, for anyone who thought I'd given up on this, I don't abandon things, you will know when I give up on a story because I will delete it (not that I plan on doing that). **

** Also, please remember to vote on my poll of whether or not I should put any romance in this fic. The current results are:**

**ZeLink: 1**

**MidLink: 1**

**RalphNayru: 1**

**OC romance: 3**

**No romance: 0**


	11. FAIL WHALE!

** Okay, I know this thing hasn't been updated lately, but my ELA and Social Studies teacher gave us like three projects that were due only days apart. I HAVE A GOOD EXCUSE FOR BEING LATE! DON'T SHOOT! Anyway, there over with now, so I can (hopefully) give these stories a bit more attention now that my brain has stopped eating my head for a while.**

** Disclaimer: I do not own Legend of Zelda, if I did, Link's vocabulary would not be limited to things like "AHH!" and "HIYAH!"**

**Chapter 11: FAIL WHALE!**

I am NEVER taking those five clowns somewhere that requires you to use U.S. currency EVER again! Of course they knew to pay before entering, stuff such as Hyrule's shooting ranges had taught them that much, but on the other hand, they had no idea what they were supposed to pay WITH!

You wanna here the whole, stupid, mind-numbing, facepalm-inducing story? You asked for it!

The ten of us entered the skate track. Now mind you, we live in a small town and this is a little place, therefore thanks to Hyrule's big-freakin' buildings, the five Links were unimpressed by the whole thing (except Red, who seemed to be excited about everything).

"Ten please," I told the woman who was selling the tickets.

I reached into my pocket to pull out my wallet and here's what I came up with, exactly ten dollars, fifty cents, a stick of gum, and an Apple Jack. "Oh crap," I muttered, turning around and smiling sheepishly at the others, "Guys..." I started.

Ginger rolled her eyes. "How much do you need, Ruby?"

"Well, if you've got it... and you're willing to hand it over... and it's not to much trouble... I might need," I backed up, "twenty bucks."

BOOM! The Ginger bomb was detonated!

"Twenty," she twitched, "bucks?"

"Ehehe..." I laughed nervously, backing up even further, "You're my best friend," I reminded her.

Dakota facepalmed. "Ruby... hn..."

Kevin patted me on the shoulder.

Lya stood back and tried to stay out of it as much as possible.

Ginger glared and reached for her wallet.

Then Green piped up. "Hey, don't do that!" he said, flashing us a smile, "We've got plenty of money!"

"You do?" Lya asked, raising an eyebrow, "Really?"

"Yeah!" Red shouted, fist-pumping, "Let us take this one! You've all done enough!"

"I agree," Green said, ruffling Red's hair, "Come on, let us pay for this one!"

"Well, okay," Dakota said, "If you're sure you have enough."

"Oh we certainly do!" Vio said, approaching the window.

I smiled slightly. It was nice of them to help us out with the money. Then a thought hit me. My smile faltered a bit. Who gave them American money?

I reached over and poked Dakota. "Psst," I hissed, "Did you give them any dollar bills before we left the house?"

Dakota looked surprised. "No way! I'm broke!" she said, "Maybe Lya gave them money."

I leaned over to Lya. "Yo, Lya," I whispered, "Did you give them any American dollars before we left."

"Err... no," she said, "Why do you want to-" her expression changed to one of shock, "Oh crud."

"Yes," I sighed, "Oh crud indeed."

"Is this a joke?" the person taking the money asked, staring at the assortment of rupees in her hand.

"No," Vio said very matter-of-factly, "It's money."

"Look, I've had a long day and if this is your idea of a joke, it's not funny," the woman informed him, taking a tone that said 'yeah, and I'd be president if my dad wasn't bald.'

"You mean you won't except it?" Red asked, almost in tears.

"Look, if you want to get in you'll come back with some REAL money," she said, trying to keep her temper under control.

"WHY I OUGHTTA-" Blue started, only to be shushed by Vio.

"M'am," he said, "we are trying to pay you. I don't believe we should be penalized if you refuse to accept our money."

"Dollar bills only," she said shortly.

"Dollar?" Red asked, giving Green a confused look, "What's a 'dollar'?"

"I don't know," Green replied, running a hand through his hair.

"You," Shadow demanded pointing at the woman, "What is a 'dollar'?"

"Excuse me?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

"You heard me," he said, "Now tell me or- MMPF!"

"Sorry m'am!" Lya said, with one hand clamped over Shadow's mouth, "He's… overly excitable."

"Get your hands off me!" Shadow shouted, squirming away from her.

"Um, o-kay?" the woman said, though really it was more of a question than an agreement. Ginger walked up to the window and handed her the money, which she took quickly, obviously eager to get us out of there.

"Fail whale," Dakota said, grabbing hold of the door handle.

"Epic fail whale," I agreed.

"Beyond even that times infinity," Lya chimed, shaking her head.

Dakota pushed the door open and we started to file into the room. Behind us, I swore I heard Red ask "What IS a 'dollar?' Can you eat it?"

"No," Kevin replied, "But you can eat ho-ho's!"

He then danced through the door, leaving the five Links behind him, wondering what the heck that last comment meant.

**(Line break- Keep Kevin away from the Ho-Ho's!)**

If there is one word out there to describe the skate track, it is LOUD! Between the teenagers talking about god-knows-what, the little kids laughing, and the blaring music, it's enough to give a person a month-long headache. In other words, it was the perfect place to talk without being overheard.

"Shoes with wheels?" Vio inquired, tapping his foot on the floor experimentally, "Your country has strange customs."

"Dude," Kevin said, "These are the BEST kind of shoes!"

"I suppose," Vio said uncertainly.

Red stood up—then promptly fell on his rear. "Ouch!" he shouted, "I don't know how to use these…"

"Chris, dude!" Kevin said, using Red's modern world name, "Come and I shall teach you the fine points of the art we call… SKATING!"

"O-okay!" Red stammered, reaching up and grabbing Kevin's hand.

Kevin and red went off to a part of the arcade that wasn't as crowded to practice skating.

Lya spoke up. "What should we do while we wait for them?" She had her hands over her ears to block out some of the noise.

I reached into my pocket and pulled out a pair of earplugs and gave them to her. Loud noises and places tend to bother me, so I usually keep them on me.

"I suppose we should find something to occupy ourselves until they're finished," Vio said, "After all there really isn't much sense in explaining anything until everyone is present."

Blue muttered something that sounded like "smarty pants" and "usin' big words."

"I'm hungry," Green said, his stomach growling as if to prove his point, "is there anything to eat here?"

"Psh, yeah," Ginger said, "But everything here's all crap and greasy and stuff. Save yourself a stomach ache and wait until we leave."

"There is one thing that's edible," Dakota said thoughtfully, "Anyone want ice cream?"

**(Page break)**

We all settled in a booth with cones of ice cream as we watched Kevin out in the arcade while he tried and failed to teach Red the finer points of skating.

Green pulled his cone close to his face and sniffed at the strawberry ice cream on it, getting a bit of the pink substance on his nose in the process.

"Fwah!" he exclaimed, "That's cold!"

"How do you eat it?" Vio asked, eyeing the cone warily, "Where's the spoon?"

"Um, it's a cone," Dakota said, giving him a what-planet-are-you-from look, "You don't need a spoon."

"Don't your fingers get all sticky?" Green asked.

"No, Green," Lya said, "You don't use your fingers. You lick it." She gave her own cone a lick to show him.

Green looked at the cone and gave it a lick. "Gwah! It's still cold!"

"Of course it is," I said, "It's frozen!"

"You don't like it?" Lya asked, looking a bit disappointed.

"No I didn't say that!" Green said, licking it again, "I do like it. I just wasn't expecting it to be so cold."

"It is good," Vio said, with a bit of vanilla on his upper lip.

I looked at Shadow. "You're not eating," I pointed out.

"I don't want it," he snorted, "its human food. I don't need such things."

"You're a jerk," I said.

Shadow remained silent but glared at me slightly.

"HECK YEAH!" Blue shouted after tasting the ice cream, "I CHALLENGE YOU ALL TO AN ICE CREAM EATING CONTEST! DON'T ARGUE WITH ME OR I'LL KICK YOUR BUTTS!"

Blue began licking the cone furiously as did Green. Shadow actually got into it as well, obviously not wanting to miss a chance to beat the Links at anything. Vio just sat there staring at the other three.

"How immature," he muttered.

"Guys," Lya warned, "don't do that!"

"Why the heck not?" Blue demanded between licks.

"Because," Ginger backed her up, "You're all going to give yourselves a-"

She was cut off by all three of them howling in pain. "MY FREAKIN' HEAD HURTS!" Blue shouted.

"Goddess!" Shadow shouted, "MY FREAKING EYE!"

I winced. That was the worst king you could possibly get and I actually felt sorry for Shadow.

"OUCH!" Green shouted, "WHAT IS THIS?"

"What happened?" A wide-eyed Vio asked.

"Brain freeze," Dakota informed him.

"It happens when you eat ice cream too fast," I said, "don't worry, they'll come down off it in a few seconds."

"Hey!" Kevin said, skating over with Red, who was still a bit wobbly on his skates, "Did anyone save me some ice cream?"

"NO!" the three Link's shouted, glaring at him, "DON'T SAY THE 'I' WORD!"

**(Page break)**

The ten of us sat on a raised area in the middle of the arcade. Explanations are always awkward, but I had a feeling this would be more awkward than anything I ever had to deal with before, especially for the Links.

Vio cleared his throat and began, as he seemed to know what he was talking about better than any of the others.

"Er," he said, "As you all know, we don't… technically belong here."

We stared at him, waiting for him to continue. He tugged at the collar of his purple polo shirt before speaking.

"We're from Hyrule, as you know, especially the two of you who are familiar with the country," he looked at Lya and me. I shrunk back a bit, not liking everyone's eyes on me.

"So I suppose the most logical place to start is how we arrived in your world," Vio stated, "Do any of you know about Power Lines?"

"Um… they give us TV signals?" Dakota asked.

"No not those power lines!" Vio facepalmed, "Energy lines!"

We all shook our heads. "Lay Lines?" he tried again.

"…"

Vio sighed. "Lay Lines are lines of spiritual energy that criss cross the planet. When a lot of lines meet in a single place, they create a power point."

"Like, Microsoft?" I asked.

"I have no clue what that means," Vio shook his head, "Power point is just a name given to a place where there is a large amount of spiritual energy. When two power points in two different worlds are located in the same spot in exactly the same position, they create a link between the worlds. That link can only be accessed by a certain type of person, and that brings us to the next point, why you five are involved in this."

"Go on," I said, getting interested.

"A power point can only be accessed by people who have strong spiritual energy, in other words—mages."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" Ginger said, raising her hands, "Slow down there Speed Racer! We are not mages! We're just boring normal people in a boring town living boring lives!"

"Trust me," Vio said, "You're world is polluted by such things as your power lines and radio interference, which repress your powers. There's simply too much interference here for you to realize they're there. However, they are and that's why you," he looked at me, "were assaulted at the park. That's the linking point. Modern Hyrule is the bridge between Hyrule and America. But what you have in modern Hyrule is what we call a 'half point' meaning that there is half the number of Lay Lines gathered there as would be in a normal power point. Therefore, the connection is weakened. Due to the weak connection it can only be opened from our side, but someone on yours can close it. You and your friends have weaker powers than most mages, I would expect it's due to the interference, but the five of you together are strong enough to access it."

"Who opened it the first time?" Lya asked.

"Vaati," Vio replied, "There was an alliance of the villains in our world to open the link and invade this world. Vaati was the one who originally accessed the link, but he soon figured out that Gannondorf and some of the other villains were only keeping him in the alliance to open the link. After that he quit and kind of went rouge mage. Without Vaati they needed to find someone else to access the gate, which was still open due to the fact that it couldn't be closed from Hyrule. Even through the interference some of the villains, such as Ghirahim, have an extremely acute ability to sense energy. That's how they tracked you down. Now they want you to go to the other side of the link to keep it open. We however, need you to stay here and try to close it."

"So basically we're caught in the middle of this crap?" Ginger demanded, "Well that's just freakin' great!"

"I'm sorry," Vio apologized, "but there's really nothing we can do but to try and keep you safe until you close the link."

"How the heck are we supposed to close the link?" Lya demanded, "We don't even know how to use these 'mage powers' you claim we have!"

"I-I don't know," Vio said. I could tell by the look on his face told me that was one of the hardest things he ever had to say.

I started to put my hand on his shoulder and make him feel better… and that's when the crash came.

Pieces of wall flew in all directions, causing a huge commotion as people hit the ground to avoid getting hit by them. As soon as I attempted to raise my head and see just what we were in for now, a boot stomped down on my back, preventing me from moving.

Someone else entered through the hole in the wall and approached us. The person stopped so close to me that my nose almost touched his white boot.

"Excellent job!" he praised the person who was holding me down. I couldn't see any of the others, but I assumed they were in the same situation I was.

The person in front of me bent down and slid a gloved hand under my chin, bringing my head up to meet his dark eyes. "Hello, dear," Ghirahim purred in a voice that sent chills up my spine.

He flicked some of his white hair out of his face with his other hand and gave me a cruel smirk. "If it's not too troublesome, I'd like you and the rest of your company to come with me."


	12. To Hyrule We Go

**Hey, I'm back again!**

**Readers: *groan* not her!**

***Ignores them* I have the current results for the poll. The romance for the story will be ZeLink and OC. I might include MidLink if I do more than one of Link's incarnations in the story so be sure to give me your thoughts on that before I make my final decision about the romance, the list above is not set in stone yet so give me your thoughts about using more than one Link. **

** Also remember to vote on the new profile poll I have up about who the OC romance should involve. I've had it up for weeks and haven't gotten one vote. Please vote because it's SUPER important! **

**Chapter 12: To Hyrule We Go**

Ghirahim's gloved hand was still holding my head up to look at him. The touch was gentle enough but there was no warmth in it at all. The other man, who I soon discovered to be Dark Link from Shadow growling something under his breath that would have given a pirate a heart attack, relieved a bit of the pressure of his foot on my back.

"You know you can't fight your way out of this," the Demon Lord purred, "Do be a good girl and save yourself and your friends quite a bit of pain."

Now this is the point in the story where the heroine does something impossibly brave and incredible like awakening some hidden power or something. Well, I did do something, I froze.

"Are you afraid?" he asked, moving his hand across my face and causing me to flinch, "Relax, as I told you earlier, if you come quietly I won't do anything to hurt you."

I stared at the sword in his hand and shivered a bit. Then I did the dumbest thing possible.

"Okay," I squeaked.

**(A bit later)**

Dark Link held my arms behind my back as we trudged through a now closed Modern Hyrule. The others were being held by other creatures. Dark Link fell into step beside the Dark Nut that was holding onto Lya.

"Hey," she whispered, "You have a plan or something right?"

I shook my head. "I never have a plan."

Lya nodded, "I guess that's understandable. I don't think I would have stood up to Ghirahim very well either."

Another Dark Nut that was holding onto Ginger came up to my other side. "What were you thinking?" she demanded, "how could you just nod like that! This guy is a freakin' psychopath!"

I swallowed hard and looked at my feet in shame. "That sword is really shiny up close," I mumbled under my breath.

Ginger's glare softened a bit but didn't entirely disappear. I really couldn't blame her for being angry with me. After all, I had pretty much yanked her along with me with that nod and that one word.

I glanced around, this part of the park looked familiar. I shuffled a bit, trying to get a better look when Dark Link's knee came up and thwacked me warningly between the shoulder blades but not hard enough to be seriously painful.

"OUCH!" I shouted, "I was just looking around!"

"Well don't," he said calmly. I had always pictured him as a silent type of person, I guess my imagination was correct.

A building loomed ahead of us. Something clicked in my brain and I realized exactly where we were headed. The Palace of Twilight that Matt had been so enthused about.

**(Page break)**

Needless to say, when Matt had brought us here I thought this was the best thing since sliced bread. Now everything about this building gave me the shivers. I could tell Lya felt the same way from how she was continuously glancing around.

Ghirahim approached the door to the throne room, which swung open with a simple snap of his fingers. Dark Link and the Dark Nuts marched inside, towing the five of us along with them.

The throne room, which I was hyperly excited about before, made my blood run cold. The first time we had entered this room, when Kevin had sat on that throne and done the King of Twilight impression, I thought the detail and the exact replification of the room had been amazing, now this all seemed much TOO exact to the original and the throne was occupied by someone who was definitely NOT Kevin.

"Holy geeze," I squeaked, my voice barely above a whisper, "Zant."

I could tell when the King of Twilight focused his attention on us, even though his helmet obscured his eyes. His eyes darted over each and every one of us and when they rested on me, I swear the room's temperature dropped a good thirty degrees.

"Are these the ones?" he inquired. His voice was much more calm and much less spazzing then I had imagined it.

"Of course these are the ones," Ghirahim said, barely containing his temper, "You honestly think that I would make such a huge mistake?"

Zant raised a hand for Ghirahim to calm down. "I didn't mean to imply that you made a mistake," he continued in his calm voice, "I was just curious!" his voice grew a bit higher pitched when he said this last part. There's the spazzing voice that I heard in my head while I played TP.

"Never mind that," Ghirahim said, "Is it still open?"

"Of course it's still open!" Zant ranted, "Who would have come by to close it?"

Ghirahim's fists were clenched by his sides and were trembling slightly. He did not like Zant much, that was apparent.

"Bring them up here," Zant said, motioning to our captors.

"All of them?" Dark Link inquired in his icy tone.

"Just one will do," Zant nodded.

I was roughly pushed from behind up the stairs to Zant's throne and shoved to the floor none too gently. Zant examined me for a few moments, making me feel more like one of the bugs in science class than I ever cared to.

"Light dwellers," he muttered, "Soon my god shall be rid of them all."

Ghirahim rolled his eyes. "Enough of this god nonsense of yours!" he spat, finally losing his temper.

Zant leapt out of the throne, very nearly crushing my hand with his foot. "IT'S NOT NONSENSE!" he roared, "IT'S FACT I TELL YOU!"

"Dark Link, bring her along," he ordered, dismissing Zant's outburst, "Without all of them we might as well not have any."

Dark Link jerked me towards the stairs again and marched me to where ever the portal was located.

"YOU'LL SEE!" Zant continued to rage behind us, "MY GOD SHALL SHOW HIMSELF! AND WHEN HE DOES, YOU'LL ALL SEE!"

The door slammed behind us, cutting him off in the middle of his speech. The web sites were right, he IS insane.

**(page break)**

The portal appeared to be a hole in the stone wall pulsing with blinding white light. I was roughly shoved from behind and very nearly fell into it.

The Dark Nuts had released their grip on the others and were pushing them towards the portal as well.

"Got a plan now?" Lya asked hopefully.

"I thought I told you," I squeaked, "I never have a plan!"

"That's reassuring," Dakota said, turning pale in the face.

"HEY!" someone shouted from the doorway.

Everyone in the room turned to face the direction the voice had come from. There was just enough room for me to see through the group of villains. A familiar looking boy with messy hair and a green tunic stood in the doorway.

"Matt?" I shouted, "What the heck are you doing here?"

"And what's with your get-up?" Ginger asked.

"If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were—" Lya stopped, "Oh my."

"He's Twilight Princess, Link!" we both shouted at the same time.

Ghirahim clapped his hands. "Bravo!" he shouted, "What a show! But it seems that the mask has been removed, boy!"

Matt—er—Link scowled and glared at the demon. "Too right," he said, "I believe I hear the final curtain call, Ghirahim."

The two stood in battle ready positions. Before the fireworks could begin, we were shoved hard from behind and went tumbling through the portal.

Link shouted something inaudible at the demon lord and that's the last thing I remember seeing before I blacked out.

** Thanks for reading and remember to vote on the poll! Also, this will be my OWN OC (so don't worry Piezelle). What's a good way to injure an oc? Nothing too graphic please, I just need a suggestion.**


	13. Wanted: Alive

**Quicker update this time! Now, normally I'd keep you all in suspense because 1) I'm eviiiiiil and 2) school would be eating me alive. But since school's calmed down and I'm in a good mood here's a fast update for you. **

**Disclaimer: ****If I owned Legend of Zelda I would be rich, live in Japan, and be a manga-ka. Unfortunately I don't so I'm stuck in the U.S. and the closest I get to Japan is staring at a world map while listening to Jpop and eating sushi.**

**Chapter 13: Wanted: Alive**

Whoever invented power points needs to be fired. Seriously. The other end of the link was on a rooftop, which by the way isn't the best place to land after being kidnapped from a skate track and dragged through a lunatic's castle by a demon. I hit the top of the roof—which really didn't hurt that much because the link was level with the roof. What DID hurt was rolling off the roof and landing on the STONE street below.

"OUCH!" I shouted, when I hit the street. Tears formed in the corners of my eyes.

Lya landed right beside me in a heap. "Oww…" she complained, sitting up and rubbing her head.

"You alright?" I asked, taking a moment to look her over from where I was sitting.

"I'm fine," she said, wincing as she touched her head, "Where ARE we?" she asked.

"I don't know," I said, glancing around, "Somewhere in Hyrule?"

"No duh," Lya replied, "We know that much."

"You know what I meant," I said, a bit irritated by my less than pleasant landing, "I don't recognize anything here," I paused, "And that's saying something because I've played a ton of Zelda."

Lya nodded. "I don't recognize it either. That's too bad, I would follow you because you've played more games than me but…"

"Yeah," I said, "I have no idea where this is."

Lya looked thoughtful. "Let's walk a little ways, knock on a few doors, and ask questions," she advised.

"Good plan," I said, "Much better than mine."

"Because you never have a plan?" she smirked.

"We met a few days ago," I exclaimed playfully, "Stop knowing me so well, you stalker!"

"Well sor-ry!" she exclaimed in the same playful tone, "Allow me to find a trash can and I'll throw my spy gear out!"

Then, for the first time since this entire thing begun, I actually felt at ease. It was a bit strange considering that we were standing in the middle of a street in a part of a strange country that neither of us knew how to navigate, but still, it was good to feel a bit lighthearted in the middle of this mess. Faint smiles appeared on both our faces and we collapsed laughing in the middle of the street.

"W-why are we laughing?" Lya shouted.

"I-I don't k-know!" I laughed, "And th-that just makes it more hilarious!"

I don't know how long we were there, but I knew my sides hurt like HECK when we stopped. It was a good pain though.

"Sh-shall we go?" I asked, calming down the last of my laughing fit.

"Y-yeah," Lya said, "Let's find a door to knock on."

**(Line break)**

One house with a light on. Seriously? That's it? You'd think in a town there'd be more than one night owl to question. Never the less, we'd take what we could get.

I nervously knocked on the door. The heavy clunk of boots on a wood floor could be heard approaching the door. A young Hylian man opened the door and looked out at us.

"Excuse me?" he asked.

"U-um," I stammered nervously, "Sorry to bother you, sir," I looked him in the eye, trying to appear more confident than I felt, "We were wondering-"

The man's blue eyes widened and he backed up a bit. "CRIMINALS!" He shouted.

Lya and I jumped back, surprised by his sudden outburst.

"I beg your pardon?" Lya cried.

"I've seen the posters around town!" he continued, "Get out of here before I call the Hylian guard!"

"W-wait, what?" I asked.

The door slammed in my face with a loud BANG. Lya looked at me with a surprised look still on her face.

"What was that?" she asked.

"How should I know?" I demanded, "That guy's nuttier than a jar of cashews!"

Lya looked behind me and froze. "Ruby, you might want to turn around," she said.

I turned slowly to face the wall. Attached to the wall were five posters with pictures of… wait—US! I ripped one off the wall and started reading it.

"Wanted alive for breaking into Hyrule Castle…" I trailed off and heaved a sigh, "You sneaky punks," I cursed the villains, "They've been reporting back here for these to be made."

"Not too eager to take any chances of letting us escape are they?" Lya shook her head.

"Definitely not," I said, "they must be pretty desperate to go through all this trouble."

Lya glanced back at the posters. "I don't know who actually staged the Hyrule Castle break in," she said, "But we'd better get outta here before the Hylian guard shows up."

"Best plan we've had all day," I muttered, grabbing her hand and taking off towards the town gates.

"I'd turn yourselves in for us if I were you," someone said.

Lya and I turned towards the sound of the voice. A familiar armor clad figure emerged from a nearby ally.

"The guards tend to be much more compassionate than me," he said, grinning widely.

"Um… Y-you know this guy?" Lya asked.

"Un-unfortunately," I squeaked.

I hated to admit it, but running towards the guard looked like a much better option than charging the General of Darkness.

**Once again, don't forget to vote on my poll! It's REALLY SUPER IMPORTANT! So important that until I collect any remaining votes, I'm not gonna be able to update cause I need to develop the romance part about NOW! So please vote on the poll!**

**Current results:**

**Ruby and Shadow: 5**

**Ruby and Vio: 2**

**Ginger and Blue: 1**

**VaatiOC: 1**

**Dakota and Vio: 0**

**Dakota and Green: 0**


	14. I Am Attacked By The Tin Man

**It's been a while. Sorry for slacking off like this but I actually forgot for a bit because of some stuff I had going on. ANYWAY now we're back on track and I've got the poll results. The OC romance will be Ruby and Shadow and some Ginger and Blue. Now before you start throwing banana peels at your monitor and screaming "BOO THEIR MARY SUES NOW!" Allow me to ask you, were they Mary Sue's before? I don't think so. And their personalities and anything else I've worked to develop with these characters will not change just because I'm throwing some romance into the mix. That being said shall we get back to the plotline? **

**Disclaimer: ****I do not own Zelda. **

**Chapter 14: I Am Attacked By The Tin Man**

Onox stood before us, holding that big freaking ball and chain that he's so keen on carrying everywhere. Though frankly, I was more worried about the other thing and I think everyone who's read the Oracle of Seasons manga knows what I'm talking about—it's the I-breath-poof-you're-dead thing.

"So what's it gonna be?" he smiled wickedly, "You kids gonna hightail it back to the guard or do I have to take you out myself?"

We both edged away nervously. The guard was looking awfully friendly right now. I was actually about to turn and drag Lya back to the castle with me when she looked at me and mouthed _back gate._

I nodded and allowed her to grab my hand and pull me behind her through the streets.

"SMARTER THAN YOU LOOK!" Onox shouted after us, "I'D RATHER OUR PRECIOUS LITTLE MAGES BE DELIVERED TO OUR BASE IN ONE PIECE!"

Lya and I zigzagged in an irregular pattern. Ducking through back alley ways and side streets, trying to avoid the main roads and the castle as much as possible, as if the guard could spot us snaking through the shadows, even though I'm sure from the watch tower THAT far away, we looked like no more than ants.

"Nice plan!" I complemented.

"Someone's gotta have one!" she replied.

"True that!" I smirked, "We're home free in a few minutes!"

**(Line break: Back at the front gates)**

"You IDIOT!" someone shouted. The voice had suddenly appeared out of thin air, shouting various insults at Onox and cursing him in a combination of English and ancient Hylian. Onox was more than a bit startled by it, though he'd never admit to it.

"L-Lord Ganondorf?" He stammered, looking in all directions for said man.

"YOU BUMBLING, IDIOTIC HEAP OF SCRAP METAL!" the disembodied voice of the Gerudo king continued to rant, "DID IT NOT OCCUR TO YOU THAT THERE ARE TWO EXITS IN EVERY CITY?"

Onox's eyes widened. "I-I-I,"he stammered, searching for the words.

"YOU WHAT?" Ganondorf demanded.

"I-I forgot…" the general said quietly.

"YOU FORGOT? LISTEN HERE YOU FOOL! YOU'D BETTER GET TO THE BACK GATES AND CATCH THOSE MAGES OR WHEN YOU RETURN, I'LL USE YOUR SCALES TO MAKE ARROWHEADS! MOVE!"

Just like that, the voice didn't speak to him again. The general of darkness immediately got moving to the south exit. If there was one thing he was sure of, it was that Ganondorf meant every word of that statement.

**(Page break and back with Ruby and Lya)**

Lya continued to pull me through the streets of Hyrule. I could see the gate a few yards away. Just as we were nearing the last few feet of our run a fog settled in. And I'm not talking about a normal fog. I mean a really dark, black, unnatural fog.

I think unnatural is the understatement of the century, actually. The fog left a lingering chill in the air, the kind that went straight through you and chilled you to the bone. It was heavy as well, almost making it hard to breath.

"Thought you had gotten the best of me, did you?" Onox asked. The fog cleared to reveal a VERY ticked off general between us and the gate. "You know if there's one thing that gets my goat, it's people trying to play me for a fool," he took a few steps forward.

I glanced around quickly, spotting a stack of crates leaning against the stone wall, apparently courtesy of Talon, who was snoring away beside them. That was all I needed, then I did something very rare for me folks, I had an escape plan.

I poked Lya. "I start to climb over the crates. While he's distracted, you turn around and run back to the other exit."

"So basically your big plan is split up because he can't chase us both?" she asked, "Because I'll go for that."

"Okay then," I whispered, "One, two, three… AHHHH!" I charged towards the stack of crates and began climbing over to the top.

"HEY, YOU!" Onox shouted, turning to face me.

As he did, Lya shot off back down the street. About ten yards away before Onox turned to see what was going on.

"HEY!" he shouted.

Yeah, like that was going to stop her.

Onox growled and started to go after her, when my foot slipped out from under me, causing me to yelp as I tried to regain my balance and returning his attention to me.

He muttered something that sounded like, "might as well get the closest one first" before darting out of the city to meet me when I jumped the wall.

I stood at the top of the wall, trying to find a position where he wouldn't immediately catch up to me and I wouldn't kill myself by jumping off a wall.

I took a deep breath. "Well, here goes nothin'," I said, leaping at the nearest tree I could climb down, "BONZAAAAAAIIIIIII!"

**(Page break)**

Allow me to say, of all the things NEVER thought I would do, jumping off a wall and landing in a tree was somewhere near the bottom of the list. As such, why the HECK would I practice jumping off a high object and landing in a tree? Ergo, I had NO idea what I was doing.

"OOF!" I shouted as I hit a tree branch. I smacked into a second branch on my way down and managed to grab onto it… unfortunately after my other arm hit it.

I cried out when my left arm made contact with the branch and bent at an unnatural angle. I climbed up onto the branch and recoiled when I attempted to touch my arm, oh yeah, it was definitely broken.

Fortunately the branch was low enough I could swing down to the ground without much of a problem. The only down side was I had to take off right away and had no time to examine my injured arm, which by the way, moved into some VERY uncomfortable positions as I ran. I certainly hoped the others were having an easier time than I was.

**(Page break)**

I dashed through the forest, stumbling over roots and my own feet. I could hear Onox crashing through the brush behind me like a very large, angry bulldozer, swinging his ball and chain wildly as he pursued me.

The weapon whistled over my head, causing me to scream with surprise as I hit the ground. Wood splinters from the unfortunate tree the contraption hit rained over me.

I sprang to my feet, my boots sliding on the muddy path making it hard to get any traction. _Curse you and your unpaved roads, Hyrule! _I thought.

I yelped as a large, armored hand closed around the back of my jacket.

"It's about time," Onox said, sounding very impatient and short tempered. He turned me to face him and lifted me off my feet by the collar of my shirt, "Be a good girl," he ordered, "and come along quietly. Some friends of mine would like to have a word with you."

I struggled to free myself. "N-no!" I gasped, "L-let go!"

"Hm… the resistance is cute," he smirked, "But do you honestly think you can get away?"

"Now, now," another voice said, "How many times must I tell you to keep your nose out of my business?" Shadow said, stepping out of the brush, "I'll give you til five to let go of her," he smirked, "That's MY prey."

"Always ruining my fun," Onox smirked, dropping me on the dirt path. The landing aggravated my injured arm and caused me to wince and bite my tongue. "You," he snarled, "are one heckuva cocky brat."

"Five seconds to leave," Shadow said, holding up his hand, "before I blast you back to whatever hole you crawled out of. I'm counting, Onox."

"You don't seriously think you—"

"Four," Shadow's face became serious.

""I won't surrender to a—"

"Three."

Onox looked a bit nervous. "You're not gonna—"

"Two."

"I-I'm not gonna surrender to a kid!" He said, backing up a bit.

"Your right," Shadow deadpanned, "You're not. ONE!"

The area darkened completely. I couldn't see anything at all, but I could certainly hear Shadow and he sounded very please with himself. When the area cleared, we were all alone. No Onox, just Shadow and I.

"Thanks?" I asked.

"Don't," he snapped, "If you think I did this out of concern for your safety then rethink your position."

U-um—" I stammered, slightly taken aback by the change of attitude.

"I have my own agenda girly," he said, returning to his usual mocking tone, "I have my own reasons for doing everything. That should be apparent by now."

He walked up to me and bent down. "Come now," he said, "Someone I know would like to meet you."

I gave him a hard slap across the face to show him exactly what I thought of that idea. "Like heck I'll follow you Mr. I-have-my-own-agenda!" I spat.

"I'm not asking," he snarled, grabbing my good arm, "I'm ordering. Come NOW!"

Taking this as my cue to run like heck, I kicked him in everyone's favorite place to hit male enemies.

"OUCH!" He howled, loosening his grip enough for me to squirm away.

I stumbled through the forest, not bothering to stick to the path and, with the exception of trees, which I did my best to avoid, I ran down anything that got in my way.

My desperation fueling my run, the forest blurred by then was suddenly enveloped by Shadow. I tripped over my boots and fell to the ground. Confused by the blackness, I brought my hand up to my face. My body tensed when I realized that I couldn't see it.

_Blind? _I thought, _Am I blind?"_

"Not permanently," someone said.

"Shadow," I muttered, "What the freak did you do?" I shouted.

"I don't you're in any position to use that tone of voice with me," he mocked, "but since I was planning on telling you anyway, you're not permanently blind. The shadows are merely obscuring your vision. Think of it as a blindfold," he said, I could practically hear that smirk of his.

His arms wrapped around me and I felt myself lift off the ground.

"Put your arms around my neck," he growled, apparently he didn't want it anymore than I did.

"I'm not coming!" I shouted, lashing out blindly.

"I'm not giving you a choice," he said bluntly.

My mind clouded as the shadows enveloped it and I fell into unconsciousness.

**Until the group gets back together I'm going to be alternating the POVs per chapter. It doesn't seem right for nobody to know what's happening to the others and only know what's happening to Ruby. The next chapter will be Lya's POV. Sorry, but this means it'll be a few chapters before you find out where Shadow and Ruby are going and what happens. **


	15. I Am Saved By A Flying Horse

**Yo, guys! It's-a me! Okay, lame Mario impression aside. To explain my absence, we had our testing last week so I was working for that. We actually have more projects from my psycho Social Studies and English teacher who always assigns us TWO PROJECTS AT THE SAME FREAKING TIME! So, yeah, I'm not too happy with her at present. Anyway, here's an update. So I apologize for my absence and these are the LAST projects this year so I'll probably be able to update more often after... I think it's next week my Japan presentation is due so... then. **

**Disclaimer: ****I don't own any of the Zelda games or the canon characters. Lya is Piezelle's. Ruby and all the other OC's are mine. I don't own Hyrule castle either (WUT! WHYYYYYYYYYYYY!).**

**Chapter 14: I Am Saved By a Flying Horse**

I zig-zagged through the streets of Hyrule. My only thought at that time was to get to the other gate before the Hylian guard spotted me. Or at least it was until I passed some more of those darned wanted posters with our faces plastered on them.

At that point I screeched to a halt and back tracked a few steps until I was right in front of them. Without a second thought, I reached up and ripped one of the posters off the wall.

"I'll see you remember our faces now!" I muttered, tearing the five posters to shreds, tossing them into the air, and allowing them to float to the ground like a shower of confetti.

"Oi!" someone shouted, "did you hear something?"

"Paper ripping?" answered another voice, "yes I did!"

_Oh fudge! _I thought.

I quickly threw my boots aside so I wouldn't make as much noise when I ran and took off in the direction opposite the voices.

It was then I heard horses galloping in my direction. The riders turned down the alleyway to investigate the noise.

"Oi!" one of them shouted, 'You there! Halt!"

"Shi-" I began, stumbling over my feet and running faster than before.

Another group of riders arrived on the other end of the alley. I skidded to a stop and looked from one end to the other and at the stone walls, attempting to see if there was a latter or anything of the sort that I could use to climb onto one of the roofs. Thankfully, it appeared that someone had forgotten to take one in after doing some roof repairs.

A hand clamped down on my shoulder. I promptly kicked out at the man, only to realize that he was bending over from his horse and I had no way to make contact from where I was standing now.

"Is this your picture on this poster?" one of the guards asked.

I shook his hand off. "No, I believe you have me mistaken for someone else."

"Really?" the guard asked, raising an eyebrow, "Miss, I think you'll understand, given the similarities, when I tell you that I don't believe you."

"Sir, you have me confused with someone else," I said matter-of-factly, "Now if you'll excuse me, I have to get home. My mother is waiting for me."

"No," he said in a somewhat annoyed tone, "I know for a fact that I have the right person. Someone grab he- OUCH!"

I will admit, a shoe is not the most formidable of weapons. But given the situation, my options we're very slim and this was definitely one of those work-with-what-you've-got moments. Despite the fact that a shoe is not sharp and pointy, it did its job well. That guard was stunned long enough for me to get to the latter.

"HEY, YOU!" someone shouted, "GET BACK HERE!"

I reached the rooftop. Some of the guards were already almost here. If I could get some momentum before they arrived, I could make it to the next roof. Or at least I hoped I could because I had never actually jumped rooftops before.

I just had to run. If I stopped and thought about what I was doing I wouldn't make the jump. I took a breath and began running towards the opposite end of the roof.

"Wait!" one of the guards shouted, "You're not going to make it!"

For that one second before the jump, I turned around and stumbled right off the edge of the roof.

"HOLY CRAP ON A STICK!" I shouted, throwing in several choice words afterwards.

I was preparing myself for the impact when someone grabbed the back of my shirt.

"That's quite some language for a young lady," someone said.

We landed back on the street with a jolt. "Umf!" I grunted.

I looked up at the person who had caught me. He was dressed in brown and had dirty blond hair and green eyes. Something about him looked a bit like Link but the resemblance wasn't very outstanding.

"There are better ways to jump roofs," he said, grinning, "might I suggest not pausing next time?"

I shot him a slight deadpan look but didn't say anything.

The Hylian Guard came galloping out into the street. "WHOO! THREE CHEERS FOR SIR RAVEN!" the all shouted, causing a few annoyed villagers to open their windows and see what was going on.

"You should thank my horse!" he laughed, "Puni's the only reason I got there in time."

The guard exploded into a fit of laugher. "THREE CHEERS FOR THE HORSE!"

My god. This day just got better and better.

**So, that's it for now folks. I promise I'll update sooner next time. I've been really busy. So until then, hasta-la-pasta~!**


	16. Just Like One Piece

**I'm sorry I haven't updated. I've been kind of busy... so yah.**

**Discalimer:**** I do not own Zelda. If I did, I would live in Japan and have a cool accent.**

**Chapter 16: Just Like One Piece (Dakota's POV)**

The room was illuminated slightly when I opened my eyes. The first thing I became aware of was the fact that my head was killing me. The seagull sounds outside weren't exactly helping.

"Mother of god! Will you stupid birds SHUT UP?" I demanded.

I stood up and stumbled, reaching out to catch my balance with the wall. I then began shaking my legs, which were so asleep I could hardly feel them, to get rid of the pins and needles.

Once I had regained the feeling in my legs, I began poking around. The space I was in was large and constructed from wood. A hatch on the other end of the room was allowing sunlight to come in and light the area enough for me to see. It appeared that I was on some sort of ship. But how would I get on a ship? And what kind of ship was it?

After a few minutes I recalled what had taken place back at Modern Hyrule. Since we had all been sent through the link, therefore, we must be in Hyrule. The only games from the series that I had actually played were "The Wind Waker" and "Phantom Hourglass" so I guess if you were going to wake up on a ship in Hyrule those were the best two to have knowledge of.

Speaking of the games, it had been a while since I had played those and I hardly remembered anything about them. Okay well, except for that one annoying guy, Linebeck was it? NO NO NO! I'D RATHER BE ON A PIRATE SHIP BECAUSE I REFUSE TO HITCH A RIDE ON THAT IDIOT'S FAILBOAT!

Heh, pirate ship! I looked down at my Trafalgar Law hoodie. Pirate ship, just like One Piece.

After I had finished musing about Linebeck, failboats, and One Piece, I began walking to the other end of the room where the hatch was. I climbed up the steps a short way because it was too high for me to reach from the ground and began to push it. It was pretty darn heavy, this might take a minute.

The grate moved slightly and I pushed harder. I didn't have to move it all the way off, just enough to be able to fit through the hole. The process was slow, maybe moving the grate a few centimeter's every few seconds but it eventually slid away enough for me to get out. It was about time too, my arms were starting to get sore.

I stuck my head out of the hole and looked around. The deck seemed empty so I climbed the rest of the way out of the hole. Unfortunately, when I turned around I saw three or four people staring at me.

"Oh... um, hi?" I asked.

One of the group, a girl with blond hair and tan skin, barely glanced at me before turning to one of the others.

"Nico! I thought I told you to lock that hatch!" she scolded.

"B-but, I thought I did, miss Tetra!" he stammered.

"Thought or KNEW?" she demanded.

"I kn-"

"Hello! Hi, I'm still here!" I interrupted, hoping someone would tell me what the heck was going on.

The girl named Tetra ignored me and continued to lecture Nico. "Well next time you better make sure! I have enough to deal with around here without random kids falling from the sky and wandering around my ship!"

"What about me falling from the sky?" I asked.

They continued to ignore me. "What's next? Another giant bird?" she demanded.

"Y-yes miss Tetra," Nico agreed, "I'll check it next time!"

Irritated, I took off my hat and threw it at the back of Tetra's head. "I AM STILL HERE, YOU BUNCH OF NOOBS!" I shouted.

"I know you're still here!" Tetra snapped, "I just don't care! I'm in the middle of something here!"

"Well excuuuuuuuse me!" I rolled my eyes, "I'm in the middle of something too! I'm in the middle of wondering how I got on "le Titanic" here!"

Tetra scowled. "Do you have any idea who you're talking to?"

I thought for a moment. "A blond chick with no social skills?"

"I'll have you know that you are speaking to the captain of this ship!" she snapped.

"Girl-don't-give-me-that-crap!" I said, snapping my fingers in a Z formation.

Tetra raised an eyebrow. "Just what do you think you're doing?"

"This-is-a-Z-for-ma-tion!" I said, snapping my fingers again.

Tetra had the 'I am not amused' face, which by the way fit her quite well.

"If you're going to hitch a ride on my ship then at LEAST stop snapping your fingers and make yourself useful!" she ordered.

"You want me to work?" I asked.

"Noooo, I want you to swing from the mast like a monkey. YES! I want you to work!" she answered.

"Why should I?" I demanded, "I'm on a random ship, in a random ocean, with a random twit as captian! Random situation is RANDOM! I did not ask to book passage with you!"

"I could toss you over," she growled.

"Fine! I will work, but I will not be happy!" I muttered.

"Just as I thought," she smirked, "And you, wait here! If you leave, I'll know about it!" she shouted, running off.

Tetra came back a few minutes later with some clothing. "Take this crap," she snapped, shoving it into my hands, "and go change."

"What's WRONG with what I'm wearing?" I growled.

Tetra wrinkled her nose. "It's weird and they aren't suited for work on a ship," she answered shortly, "I won't be distracted by that... whatever it is you're wearing," she pointed to my hoodie, "and I won't have you come crying to me that you got your clothes dirty."

"I don't cry when my clothes get dirty," I snorted, "That's the prep's job!"

"Put on some decent pirate clothes!" she ordered.

I looked down at my Trafalgar Law hoodie and jeans. "These ARE my pirate clothes!"

"Nico," she said, ignoring my last statement, "Take her to one of the unclaimed rooms to go change."

"Yes, miss Tetra," he said, "Follow me, miss."

"Oi! Didn't you hear what I just said?" I asked.

Tetra ignored my question and shooed me after Nico. Oh yeah, being on her ship was going to be heaps of fun.

**(Page break thingy goes here)**

Nico led me to a room fixed up with a place to sleep and a few shelves on the wall.

"This room hasn't been claimed by anyone yet," he said, "You can use it as you please while you're staying with us, miss."

"Thanks," I said.

"I'll leave for you to change," he nodded, "Meet us back on the deck when you're done."

Nico started out of the room and then turned around. "Oi, a bit later when you're done with miss Tetra's stuff meet up with me. I have something I'd like to show you."

I nodded to him. "Kay then."

After Nico left, I took one look at the clothes Tetra had given me. "Nah!" I said, tossing them into a barrel on the other side of the room, "WHOO TWO POINTS!"

I turned around and walked out of the room and onto the deck backwards, still wearing my Law hoodie and jeans

Tetra glared at my back, which was facing her at the time. "Didn't I tell you to go change?"

"Well I did!" I said innocently, "I followed him down to my room walking forwards and then I changed direction and came back up here backwards!" I then proceeded to do a mocking backwards victory dance.

Tetra rolled her eyes. "Do you have ANY idea how stupid you look right now?"

"Nope!" I said, "So thank god I have you around to tell me, Jack Sparrow!"

"Whatever!" she snorted.

"Obviously, you don't appreciate the true genius behind my mocking victory march," I stated, starting to do something that Ruby and I call "the arrow dance." I heard a few crew members snickering behind me, "Your complete lack of win disturbs me."

"Gonzo, would you go bring a mop and some water so our new swabbie can start cleaning the decks?"

"Right away!" he said, running off to get said items.

"Crap!" I mumbled, "I forgot about the cleaning!"

Tetra took the bucket and mop from Gonzo, who had just returned and handed it to me. "Get to work!" she ordered, "And at least put on some decent work boots!"

Tetra turned around and walked off, leaving me to scrub the deck.

I looked down at my sneakers and sighed. "Haters gonna hate."


	17. I Am Taken Prisoner By A Ranch

**WHOO HOO ANOTHER CHAPTER, I'M ON A ROLL! I have nothing more to say so let's get this par-tay started!**

**Disclaimer: If I owned Zelda Operation Moonfall would be unnecessary because I would have already made a remake of Majora's Mask. God how I want a remake of Majora's Mask...**

**Chapter 17: I Am Taken Prisoner By A Ranch (Ginger's POV)**

I didn't exactly know what to expect when those bozo's back at that moronic theme park pushed me through this "link" or whatever the fudge it was called, but falling through the air and landing in a mound of stinking hay definitely hadn't entered my mind as a possible outcome.

"Ugh!" I groaned, pinching my nose, "god I hate hay! It smells!"

Of course the smell isn't the only reason I hate hay. It gets stuck to your clothes and in your hair and when that happens, I'm not going to lie to you folks, it itches like crazy.

I climbed a little ways out of the haystack so I could look around. I was outside of a barn. The sun was out and it was hot but not unbearable. I could also see a house a little ways away and a horse pasture behind me. So therefore, I must be on some kind of farm! Brilliant deduction sherlock!

I got my balance and started to climb down the side of the haystack. Has anyone ever told you that you can't get any traction on a pile of hay? Well nobody ever told me that either but it would have been nice to know! Ruby always does crap like climbing haystacks whenever we go to the pumpkin patch in the fall. All those times she could have mentioned that to me and all she talked about was Japan and ducks!

Anyway, enough about my sapzzy, Japan obsessed friend and back to the hay. Since I couldn't get any traction on this crap instead of climbing down the pile and reaching the ground, my feet slipped out from under me about halfway and I landed face first on the ground. Yeah, that's exactly how I like to start my mornings, with a mouthful of dirt.

I climbed to my feet and brushed myself off. I probably looked like a mess, with dirt all over my clothes.

Once it looked like I had gotten all the dirt I was going to get off my clothes, I closed my eyes and pointed in a random direction.

"My Christopher Colombus senses tell me that I need to walk in this direction," I said, using the method of randomly choosing a direction because I had no idea where I was going to have to go to find the others. When I opened my eyes, I found that I was pointing at the back of the barn. "And apparently, my Christopher Colombus senses need some improvement."

I glanced around looking for a place where they could be. "Well I see horses, horse pasture, fence, fence, fence, and... yeah shut up now because everything in that direction is apparently fence!" I snapped at myself.

At the moment it looked like my best bet was to walk towards the farm house and see where I ended up, which was what I was about to do when I heard someone snoring. I stopped walking and walked back to the pile of hay.

"Okay, so which one of those dweebs fell asleep behind this thing?" I questioned, kicking the haystack with the toe of one of my hightops. "It better be one of those guys. I'm already sick of being in this dump of a game world by myself."

"Hey you!" someone shouted.

I turned around to see a frustrated looking girl with red hair heading towards me. Now if Ruby was here, I'm sure she could tell me exactly which one of her lame-o characters this was. However, since Ruby wasn't here I decided that I was going to just have to play it cool and go with whatever came along.

"Yeah, you there in the odd clothes!" she repeated, "You haven't seen a guy around here asleep somewhere, have you?"

"Err... I heard some person snoring behind this pile of hay if that helps," I answered, resisting the urge to go into rapid-fire question mode.

The girl sighed and walked to the other side of the hay pile. "Papa," she said, sounding irritated, "Papa!" she tried again, "PAPA!"

"AH!" whoever was back there shouted in alarm, "W-wha-? Who woke meh ahp? Y'all in terouble!" **(lol, Piezelle gave me this line)**

"You fell asleep again!" she groaned, "This is the fifth time today! I thought you were putting this hay in the barn!"

"Oh..." the other person yawned, "Is that so?"

"Yes papa," she growled, "That. Is. So!"

I ducked back behind the hay stack, curious to see what was going on.

"Oh well then," he said, "I guess I should get back on that. After... I sl...eep..." he sighed, starting to nod off again.

"Oh no you don't!" she ordered, shaking him and trying to wake him up again. Needless to say, the guy slept hard. "Oh honestly!" she sighed, rolling her eyes.

"Soo... I'm guessing this is your dad," I said, recalling that I had heard her call him "papa" earlier.

"Yeah," she sighed, "that's him..."

I whistled. "He sleeps hard, huh?"

"Unfortunately, yes," she grumbled.

A third person walked up to us. I wasn't sure if it was just me but this guy kind of resembled a weasel. I had a feeling if Ruby's dad was here, that would be exactly what he'd call him. Her dad gives nicknames to everyone.

"Talon's sleeping his life away again, eh?" he asked. God, this guys voice even reminded me of a weasel! "I swear, if it wasn't for me nothing would get done around here! Has it ever occurred to you all that I'M the only one who keeps this ranch running?"

The girl smiled a bit. "Haha, you're right Ingo!" she laughed, "We definitely couldn't manage around here without you!"

The guy named Ingo picked up a pitch fork and began busily shoveling the hay into the barn, grumbling something about the other guy being a lazy bum under his breath.

"Sorry about him," the girl sighed, "He just gets stressed sometimes."

"I deduced that," I said, "it must be SO much fun to deal with him all the time." she obviously had more patience than I do because if I had been the one dealing with him, I would have been beating his butt black and blue with a blunt object by now.

The girl shrugged. "He's not that bad once you get to know him."

She shook her head and stuck out her hand. "I'm being rude," she said, "My name is Malon and that man over there with an extreme case of the lazys is my father, Talon."

I shook her hand. "Ginger," I said plainly.

"Pleasure," she said, "It's been a while since we've had any visitors around here. So, welcome to LonLon Ranch."

_LonLon ranch? _I thought, _What kind of stupid name is that? _Never the less, I managed to keep a straight face. "Nice place."

"Thanks!" Malon smiled, "so what brings you here."

"The sky," I said, pointing upwards. Well hey! I wasn't lying!

"Sky?" she asked, "Like riding that owl who comes around here?"

"Yeah, sure kid," I said, "Why not?" _Pfft? Riding an owl? What?_

"Okay then..." she said, obviously expecting a bit more of a response than that, "Where you staying?"

"Psh, heck if I know!" I snorted.

"Oh really?" she asked excitedly, "So you're on the road?" she got closer to my face, "And you need a place to stay?"

"Uh... maybe..." I said, backing up a bit only to be followed by her, "Hey, you wanna back up a little there?"

"Stay with us!" she cried, still in my face.

I jumped and fell backwards onto my rear. "Wait? What?"

"Yeah! It'll be amazing!" she cheered.

"Whoa you! Hold on a minute!" I started.

"Papa! We're going to have a guest!" she said excitedly.

"T-tha's nice Malo'..." he said, barely awake.

"I never agreed to-" I started again.

"Whoo! I'll start getting a room ready for you!" she sang, skipping back to the house.

I gritted my teeth. "LISTEN WHEN PEOPLE TALK TO YOU, TWIT!" I shouted, but it was too late. Malon was already too far away to hear me.


	18. I Meet Rodger

**AND A THIRD! OH SNAP!**

**Disclaimer:**** I don't own Zelda.**

**Chapter 18: I Meet Rodger (Kevin's POV)**

When I opened my eyes the first thing I noticed was the fact that I had dirt in my mouth. "Bleh!" I spit on the ground. Eww... now I know what they put in Betty Bot's Every Flavor Beans. Apparently I had fallen and landed on my face, which probably wouldn't be that weird considering the fact that... hi... it's me, except that there was nothing to trip over around here. In fact it looked kind of... desert-type. Man I wished there were two "s"s in that because I was hungry.

I looked in every direction trying to find something or someone, including up at the sky. I have no clue why I would find someone up in the sky, but I did it anyway. When I did I could see the last of the link back disappearing.

"No! No, you!" I shouted, jumping up and down and grabbing at the light, "COME BACK HERE, I NEED YOU!"

I watched as the last of the link faded and then I sat on the ground. "NOOOO! WHYYY? WHY? WHYWHYWHYWHY? THERE'S NOTHING AROUND HERE AND I'M GONNA DIE! I DON'T WANT TO DIE HERE! I WANT TO DIE SURROUNDED BY SUGAAAR!"

I allowed myself to fall backwards onto the ground and closed my eyes. "Whyyy?"

It was hot out there and even though I wasn't doing anything, I was still sweating. You know when someone shines a light in your face and you have your eyes closed but you still know it's shining on you because it's so bright? Well I was about to get up and start walking when that's what I saw.

"AHH! NOO! I SEE THE LIGHT!" I shouted, opening my eyes.

"Ah!" someone shouted.

I bolted upright and found that I was looking at a... what the fudge sandwich? A robot monkey?

"Who are you? _bzzt," _it spoke in a mechanical tone, "_Bzzt. _What are you doing here? _bzzt."_

I blinked a few times. "Hey little guy," I said.

"Hello. _Bzzt,_" it said, "Who are you? _bzzt,_" it repeated.

"I am the one and only Kevin!" I fist pumped.

"I see. _Bzzt,_" it said, "Hello, Kevin. _Bzzt._ I am robot number 125-B. _Bzzt._"

I looked at the robot monkey. "No, dude!" I said, "You've gotta have a better name than that!"

"Robot number 125-B is my name. _Bzzt._" it repeated.

"That's boring," I said, "I think I'll call you Rodger Bob Carlson Posidon Allen James Cookie Minecraft-Creeper Cheesenip Rupert Johnson That-Cactus-Over-There Arthur Sebastian The Third! Or Rodger for short!"

"Robot number 125-B is my name. _Bzzt._" the robot monkey said, turning and staring to float away.

"WAIT FOR ME RODGER! WAAAIT!" I shouted, charging after it, "TO INFINITY AND BEYOND! AND HELP ME FIND THE OTHERS!"

"Robot number 125-B. _Bzzt._"

"Don't resist the name! You'll never win!" I dug around in my pocket and pulled out a bag of jellybeans, "Huzzah! I found sugar!"

I continued following Rodger for a long ways. It was getting hotter and I was getting kind of thirsty. Can jellybeans make you thirsty? Oh well, because I was not giving up my jellybeans!

I was about to tell him to hold up when he suddenly stopped.

"Whoa there! Rodger, dude! Why are we stopping man?" I asked.

"Destination has been reached. _Bzzt,_" he buzzed.

"Whoa, dude! Where are we now?" I asked, realizing that we were standing near the edge of a hole with a path leading down to the bottom.

I approached the edge and looked down. "ROBOT MONKEYS!" I gasped, "Rodger, you have friends down there?" I asked, "Do they know where the others are?"

I immediately took off down the steep path to the bottom of the hole, stumbling occasionally.

"'Sup, robot monkey dudes?" I asked when I reached the bottom, "You haven't seen a punk girl, a girl with anger management issues, and a girl with a One Piece obsession, have you?"

"_BZZT! BZZT! BZZT! _INTRUDER!" they all buzzed at the same time, heading straight for me.

"Whoa, dudes!" I shouted, "I just wanna talk!"

"INTRUDER! _BZZT!_ INTRUDER!_ BZZT! _INTRUDER!"

I began backing towards the path with the robot monkeys still advancing. I turned around and ran back up the path. "NO ROBOT MONKEYS! YOU CANNOT HAVE MY JELLYBEANS!"

"INTRUDER! INTRUDER! INTRUDER!"

"LEAVE ME ALOOOOOONE!" I shouted. I reached the top of the hole and began running in a random direction.

I had been running for a few minutes when I spotted something faint in the distance. Were those buildings?

"YES I'M SAVED!" I shouted, turning around and blowing a raspberry at the robot monkeys, who were still chasing me, "AHAHAHA! TAKE THAT ROBOT MONKEYS!"

**(And here we switch to a general POV)**

The citizens of Kakariko Village were staring at this odd kid, who was hurdling towards the town.

"What on earth?" Barns asked. The metal mask he used while he was making bombs fell down over his eyes and he pushed it back up so he could clearly see the boy.

The kid continued running, even after he had run past the onlookers. "HELP! HELP! ROBOT MONKEYS ARE AFTER MY JELLYBEANS!"

Everyone present looked at him oddly until the mining robots showed up at the gates.

Renado sighed. These robots seemed to freak out about the simplest of intrusions. "Robots!" he said, "Back to your mine!"

On his word the robots turned and began heading back to the mines.

The boy skidded to a stop and ran back towards the villagers. "Whoa dude! That was awesome! You're like a robot whisperer or something!"

The citizens stared at him oddly. This was a strange one indeed.

**AN:**

**Well that's it for this chapter! I hope I amused you with my robot and jellybean humour!**


	19. I Am Summoned By The God Of Hurricanes

**And yet another new chapter makes its home on this site. For all of you who reviewed saying they want to see Ruby/Shadow, well, we're back to her POV. Keep in mind though, that developing romance between two characters takes time and, well, this IS Shadow we're talking about so I'm pretty darn sure that he's not the kind of guy who's going to confess his love or even realize his love for someone within a few paragraphs. Just a note, don't look for them to kiss or anything in this chapter.**

**Disclaimer:**** I don't own Zelda. If I did I would make my OC's cannon.**

**Chapter 19: I Am Summoned By The God of Hurricanes (Ruby's POV)**

**(General POV)**

Argarok flew in a shaky fashion. The dragon dipped high and low and struggled against the winds, which we're increasing in speed the further he, his rider, and their unconscious passenger advanced. A particularly strong gust caught him, causing him to rear back and give a surprised roar.

Shadow Link almost lost his grip in an attempt to hold on for his own safety and grab the back of Ruby's jacket before she fell off the dragon.

"Watch it, you bloody animal!" he spat, "I worked too hard catching up with this twit for you to buckle under a little wind and send the brat flying!"

Argarok gave a roar, which in dragon was probably either an apology or a sarcastic comment. Given the way Shadow was addressing him, it was probably the latter.

"Can't handle a little wind?" Shadow continued, "Then maybe I should contact master and have him pick us up himself! But of course, you do know how he gets when he's disturbed."

At this the creature seemed to straighten out immediately. He continued his shaky flight, but seemed more concentrated on his destination and passengers. Despite the violent gusts of wind, he didn't allow himself to be surprised again.

"I thought as much," Shadow mumbled.

Argarok didn't respond. He simply continued on to their destination, which was coming into sight.

**(Ruby's POV)**

I closed my eyes as soon as I opened them. The light, even though it was only candle light, seemed blinding after having my vision impaired for so long. I reopened them a crack to allow them to adjust before sitting up.

The room was made completely of stone, much like the rooms you see in Hyrule Castle on the Zelda games. _So, did he bring me to Hyrule castle?_ I asked myself, _No, that wouldn't make any sense. What idiot would give Shadow Link access to Hyrule Castle? And even if he was given the leash to come and go as he pleased, there would be no reason for him to take me there. Especially after the faces of my friends and I are on wanted posters plastered all over castle town. The only thing that would be back at Hyrule castle was the Hylian Guard and I thought it was the Link's job to keep us OUT of a position to be captured._

So that settled it. This was definitely not Hyrule Castle.

I stood up and began wandering around to examine the room more thoroughly. It was illuminated by candles for obvious reasons (namely that there was no electricity in Hyrule). It was dark out and even with the moon shining, I was grateful for the candles. I don't like dark places in general, but waking up in a dark place with no idea where you are would be a bit much.

The area I had been sleeping on was a small bed with a mattress. Which wasn't the most comfortable bed I had ever slept in but it wasn't rock-hard either. Another thing I noticed was the fact that the window was barred.

I walked over to the door and rattled the handle. It was locked tight so where ever I was, they obviously didn't want me getting out.

The only exits seemed to be the door and the window I mentioned earlier. In other words, if I wanted out I'd better get bitten by that radioactive spider pretty darn fast.

I went over to the window and tugged on the bars. As I had first thought, they were in there good and there was no pulling them out.

"Just terrific," I groaned, walking back over to the bed and sitting down. I began to fiddle with the tie around my neck while I tried to think up an escape route, which by the way isn't an easy thing to do when your entire brain is freaking out on you.

As I was thinking over the situation, the door creaked open. I jumped a mile and was immediately on my feet on the other side of the room.

Yes I know, running to the other side of the room, such great defensive skills I have. But it seemed that unless I wanted to throw a candle stick at the person who was opening the door, that was my only option.

"Aww," Shadow smirked, "you scared, little girl?"

I stared at him for a moment. "You-" I started, "YOU JERK!"

"Pfft, really 'jerk' is all you can come up with?" he snorted, "Of course I don't think I'd expect anything more from a human's tiny mind."

I picked up one of the metal candle holders and threw it at him. "I'LL TEACH YOU SOMETHING! YOU TWIT!"

Shadow moved aside as the candle stick went sailing by and disappeared into the Shadows. Before I could even register that he was gone he was right up on me with his hand clamped around my wrist.

"You have lousy aim," he smirked, tightening his grip a bit.

I gritted my teeth. "Stop that!" I snapped.

"Why?" he asked innocently, holding it tighter still.

"Stop it!" I growled, using my other hand to try and pull his fingers from around my wrist.

"But why?" he smirked.

"Let go of me! You're hurting me!"

"Oh am I?" he asked with mock surprise. His expression then returned to the usual smirk, "Good."

He kept his hold on me and began dragging me towards the door.

I punched at him with my free hand.

"Ow!" he growled, rubbing his shoulder and shooting me a glare.

"Oh did I hurt you?" I asked, "Good!"

"You listen here!" he snapped, twisting my arms behind my back so I couldn't punch him again, "I have very little patience today! I wouldn't push your luck if I were you!"

I winced. My arms weren't in the most comfortable of positions. I kicked behind me, hoping I could get at least one shot in, no matter how little it phased him.

Shadow tightened his grip and twisted my arms more before I could make contact. "Don't try me!" he snapped.

I gasped in pain and stopped trying to kick him. "I-I'll get you later," I mumbled.

"Doubt it," he snorted, shoving me along, "Now shut up."

**(Line break thingy goes here)**

I figured our short journey had come to an end when I was shoved none too gently to the stone floor of one of the larger rooms in the building.

Shadow sighed and hauled me to my feet by the back of my jacket. "Get up," he ordered.

"So I see you've woken up," someone at the other end of the room spoke.

I raised my head to see who had spoken and almost fell over again from how high I jumped.

"Master," Shadow bowed, though I could tell by some slight hints that he didn't care for the other person as much as he wanted it to seem he did.

The fellow sitting in the chair on the other side of the room gestured for Shadow to straighten up with a wave of his hand.

"So this is one of the unfortunate mages who has been chosen to replace me," Vaati spoke in a smooth, calm voice, "I would have expected more than this," he continued.

I would have made a face at the fact that he was basically saying that I was close to nothing if I hadn't been feeling so many mixed emotions at the time.

"Never the less," he said, "I suppose I should welcome you to my home, girl," he smirked. It was a very cocky smirk that almost rivaled Shadow's, which was saying something. "Let's see what my replacement is made of, shall we?" he purred, "Prepare yourself for battle!"

**AN:**

**Lol, this took longer than I thought it would to write. Sorry folks! Now if you'll excuse me, I must run away to prevent Ruby from beating the crap out of me for making her have to fight Vaati. *flees***


	20. That One Nosey Guy

**I'm back and I brought pie!**

**Reviewers: What flavor is the pie!?**

**PIE FLAVORED! *shot for ASDF movie reference***

**I would like the clear up the "Betty Botts Every Flavored Beans" thing. I do know that they are from HP as I am a huge fan of the Harry Potter things. There actually used to be a place at the mall in my town where you could buy "Bertie Botts Every Flavored Beans." That's why I made the reference. The real "Kevin" I know and I used to eat them as well as my other friends. **

**Unfortunately, they stopped selling the candy at the mall but I didn't complain too much because my friend dared me to "eat that grey one" a week before they stopped selling them. After that I think I had officially lost my appetite for the candies.**

**Lol, and the "Betty" thing instead of how you actually write it, that can be attributed to the fact that I can't spell. I'm not going to correct it though because to do that I would have to edit that one word on my word processer then take the entire chapter off the site and reupload it with that one word changed. XD I'm a lazy bum, so I'm not going to do that.**

**Disclaimer: ****I do not own Zelda. If I did I would be the happiest person alive. Unfortunately, there are no plans to sell the rights so I guess I will have to eat sushi and settle for being the second happiest person alive while I watch my anime.**

**Chapter Twenty: That One Nosey Guy(Lya's POV)**

"Excuse me," I said to Raven, "but is this really necessary?" I lifted my wrists which were tied with one end of a rope. The other end was around the horse's neck.

Raven glanced back behind him at me. "Ah but answer me this," he said, "would you stay put back there if I didn't?"

"No..." I admitted, knowing full well that if he hadn't tied me some way I would have jumped off the horse and run away by now.

"Exactly," he said, "So to answer your question miss...?"

"Lya," I said flatly, trying to find a way to untie myself.

"To answer your question, miss Lya, yes I do believe it's necessary," he said.

I gave up trying to get loose. If nothing else, he could tie a good knot.

"Just stay still," he ordered, "We're almost there anyway."

"Where?" I asked.

"Hyrule Castle of course," he answered.

**(Line break)**

Have you ever thought of what Hyrule Castle would look like if it was real and not just a bunch of digital pixels and what-not in your game system? It is huge! REALLY HUGE! I might have been enjoying myself, had I arrived under different circumstances.

There was something a bit different about it than I imagined though. I thought for a moment, trying to put my finger on it. It was something about the air about the place but I couldn't quite figure out what.

Raven dismounted outside the gates and untied the rope from around the horse's neck.

"Does this mean I'm getting untied now?" I asked hopefully.

"No," he replied, leading me along with the other end in his hand.

The gate closed behind us as we entered. Well that was great, I'd have to climb out a window or something if I got a chance to get away.

"Come on!" I said, "Where am I gonna go? The gate's closed!"

"Miss Lya, I am not untying you," he answered.

"Why not?" I asked.

"Come on," he said, avoiding my question and leading me along through the castle.

"Hey, where are we going?" I demanded.

"Well miss Lya, where do YOU think we're going?" he asked.

**(Line break goes here)**

Annoyed person is annoyed. Raven had "escorted me to my room" a.k.a. slammed the door of one of the cells below the castle behind me.

It was going on twenty times searching the room for an exit and ten of those times I had paused to try and get the obvious exit open.

I was getting sick of this and wished that I had access to some of my supposed "mage powers" at the moment. Maybe if I did I could just poof the door open or something

"Psst, hey!" someone said, causing me to jump and look away from what I was doing, almost punching the other person in the face through the bars.

"Gwah!" Green shouted in alarm, jumping back, "Calm down! It's me!"

I relaxed and refrained from following through with the punch. "God, don't sneak up on me!"

"Sorry," he apologized, "But I think when you see what I stole you'll forgive me!" He smiled and held up the keys to the door.

My eyes widened. "Open it, man!" I cried.

"Gimme a second," he said, kneeling down and fiddling with the key in the lock until the door swung open.

"So that's it?" I asked, stepping out, "I thought some kind of alarm would go off or something."

"Well we have an alarm but the guard in charge of that is taking a nap," he said, with a slightly guilty look. I could tell he felt a little bad about knocking the fellow out.

"Well, then that's it!" I said eagerly, making for the exit, "let's get out of here!"

Green grabbed my arm and pulled me along towards another set of stairs in the other direction.

"Hey, this is the way out!" I told him, pointing to the stairs I had just been heading for, "Where are you going? We have to get out of here before we get caught!"

"Not yet," he said, still pulling me along, "There's something we've got to do first."

"Something to do?" I asked, "Couldn't it wait?"

"No," he said, "there's someone I think you should meet while we're here as well."

"Be that as it may, if I go up there like this I'm going to be recognized for sure," I pointed out.

Green stopped walking and groaned. "Oh yeah, you're right," he grumbled, "I-I'll just- I'll think of something!"

He dropped my hand and began poking around, what he was hoping to find in this pile of junk down here, I had no idea.

"Umm... what are you looking for?" I asked.

"Just... give me a minute," he said, "AHA! Here's something!"

He came out of the clutter around us with a dark green hooded cloak in his hands. "Here wear this with the hood up," he said, "No one will know! And besides, you're with me so hardly anyone will be suspicious!"

I took the cloak from him and started to put it on over my normal clothing. "You said HARDLY anyone?" I asked, "I don't like the sound of that HARDLY."

"Well... yes there is one guy..." he said, "Just nod a lot if he tries to talk to you. He's pretty nosey."

"Will do," I said, pulling the hood up over my head.

"Great!" Green said, "It's perfect! Let's get going!"

**(Line break)**

Green wasn't kidding when he said hardly anyone would be suspicious if I was walking with him. Well after all, he is pretty well known around here so I guess that's not all that surprising.

He was leading me along towards another flight of stairs when we almost ran into someone who was coming in the opposite direction.

"Watch it boy!" the other person snapped in a nasty tone of voice.

I glanced towards the other person and found myself staring at... what the heck? A leprechaun?

"Sorry, Chancellor," Green said politely, but there was something in the way he spoke that gave away the fact that he wasn't too fond of this person.

"Oh you're SORRY are you?" the chancellor grumbled.

"Yes," Green answered somewhat shortly, "I am sorry."

"Tch," the chancellor snorted, "And who are you?" he asked me.

"A friend," Green answered for me.

"Oh another brat, is it?" he demanded, "The last thing we need around here!"

"Chancellor Cole," Green said, his patience appearing to be wearing very thin, "I'm afraid that we're in a hurry."

"Yes..." Cole said, eyeing me carefully, "Vey well then."

The Chancellor pushed past us and continued to the bottom of the stairs. When he reached the bottom he turned around to face us. "I'm watching you two now," he told us, "Don't think you can muck about the castle doing whatever." Then he turned back and walked away.

"I'm guessing that would be that one nosey guy you were telling me about earlier?" I asked Green.

"Yeah," he answered, "Chancellor Cole. He's really NICE, as you can see."

"Yes very..." I mumbled, "And a little creepy as well."

"He's VERY creepy!" Green growled, "Nobody around here likes him. People are unnerved by him and there are rumors flying around all over the place that he has some kid of hidden agenda or something."

"Wow," I said, "And has anyone used any proof of this supposed agenda to boot him out of his position?"

"They've tried," Green said, "There's just not enough proof to get him out. I mean, he's mean, he's arrogant, he's creepy, but that's not enough to force him out of his position. As long as the king trusts him, he'll remain here. And there's just not enough dirt on the guy floating around out there to persuade the king that he's bad news."

"Wow, so you just can't win, huh?" I asked.

"Nope, we can't," Green said, "If we could win we would have been over the last jump in the horse race by now. Anyway, it looks like we're here."

Green knocked on a nearby door.

"Enter!" someone called from inside.

Green opened the door and walked in with me following him. The girl standing on the other side of the room turned and smiled at us.

"Good evening," she said.

Green smiled at me, "Lya Saito, I would like you to meet Zelda, Princess of Hyrule."


	21. Captain Failboat Arrives

**^^ I'm back again. Before I start, just let me tell you this even though you probably won't read it. I'm very glad I found a way to incorporate Spirit Tracks in my last chapter. ST was a very special game for me. I know a lot of people ignore it and claim that it wasn't up to par with a lot of the other games, but I can honestly say it was my absolute favorite. Not only was it interesting, it was also the game that first got me into the Zelda series. So I just wanted to get that off me.**

**Also, I would like to clear something up. I know from my reviews that a few of you have been trying to figure out what games the five OC's have landed in. I'll answer all your questions- don't waste your time with that. They haven't landed in a specific game at all. The world they're in is a combination of all the games. Everything exists at the same time in the same place so they aren't in a specific game. Like Kevin, he's in Kakariko Village from Twilight Princess but he's there because he was chased by the robots from Skyward Sword.**

**Disclaimer: ****If I owned Zelda I wouldn't be broke right now and I would go to Suncoast and do a great deal of damage to their anime section. **

**Chapter 20: Captain Failboat Arrives (Dakota's POV)**

"Is she giving you a tough time?" someone asked.

I looked up and saw the Link of this world sitting on one of the nearby barrels.

I shrugged. "You better not have walked over that part of the deck I just cleaned."

"Don't worry," he answered, "I didn't. I've cleaned enough decks on this ship to know to be mindful of when other people are doing it," he shrugged, "Anyway, if she's being too hard on you I can talk to her."

"And that'll work?" I asked.

"Probably not," he replied.

"Well then, nope!" I said, "But thanks for the offer."

"Welcome," he nodded, "by the way, Tetra told me to send you over to Nico. He has your next job for you."

"Greeeeeat..." I rolled my eyes, "More work!"

"That's the way it works around here, " Link said.

I sighed. "Speaking of Nico, where is he anyway?"

"He should be waiting for you below deck."

"Seems legit," I huffed, heading for the hatch that would lead me below deck.

**(Line break)**

Nico seemed more happy and hyper than he was when I had first met him. I guessed without Captian Know It All up on deck around, he felt like he could actually relax.

"Hey there, Swabbie!" he chirped, "I have a job for you! Errr...?"

"Dakota," I told him, "And what's a swabbie?"

"Well Dakota, a swabbie is the lowest ranking member on the ship. We call it a swabbie because... well they usually wind up swabbing the deck."

"I noticed that..." I said, looking at the wet places all over the legs of my jeans from where I had splashed water on myself by accident.

"Now, Dakota!" he said, "About that job! Are you ready for this? It's gonna be hard!"

"Err... sure?" I asked, wondering what this super hard job he had for me was.

"Great!" he said, "Here's what you need to do!"

He grabbed a nearby rope and started swinging over the room, landing on the raised platforms scattered across the floor until he reached the other side.

"JUST DO WHAT I JUST DID!" he shouted from where he was standing on the other side of the room.

"Do that?" I asked, "That's easy!"

"Don't take the challenge lightly!" he called, "It's not as easy as it looks!"

"Yeah, yeah!" I shouted, grabbing one of the ropes, "Swing on ALL the ropes!" I shouted as I approached the first platform.

I was over it and about to put my feet down when the rope began to swing back. "Oi you!" I shouted, "I'm not ready yet!"

I put my feet down, barely landing on the platform on my toes and falling backwards onto the floor.

"Ow!" I complained.

"Nice try, Swabbie!" Nico laughed, "Climb back to the start and do it again!"

"Do I have to?" I groaned.

"Yes!" he shouted, "Yes! Yes you do!"

"Okaaaay," I said, grabbing the latter and starting to climb back up to the start, "So," I said, "would you care to tell me the point of all this?"

"Well," he smirked, "You get over here and I might tell you..."

I sighed. "Okay, fine! You win, I'll do it!"

"Atta girl!" he cheered.

I grabbed onto the rope again and began swinging across to the first platform again. When I reached it I didn't wait for the rope to swing back. As soon as I was over it I jumped off. This time I landed on the platform... on my back, which by the way wasn't a comfortable landing.

"Ow!" I complained again.

"There you go!" he shouted, "You got it!"

I sat up and realized that I had landed on the first platform. "Yessss!" I shouted, grinning and giving Nico the "thumbs up" sign.

I reached for the next rope, swinging across and starting to hum the tune to one of Avenged Sevenfold's songs. Don't judge me! I like metal!

I landed successfully on the next platform. "WOOT!" I shouted, jumping up in the air.I was about to reach for the third rope when Guess-Who showed up.

"What are you doing?" Tetra demanded, "You're supposed to be working! And you, Nico! I left you to give her the next assignment and here you two are playing games!"

"I'm sorry," I said, deciding to use one of my favorite quotes, "I have gone temporarily deaf and haven't heard a word you've just said."

Tetra glared at me. "I'm letting you stay on this ship under the condition that you do some work!" she snapped, "Now hop to it!"

"Don't order me around when I'm swinging on ropes and humming Avenged Sevenfold songs like a boss!" I snapped back.

"I don't care what you're doing!" she growled, "I am the captain on this ship! I give the orders! And I am telling you to get to work NOW!"

"Nag. nag, nag!" I said.

"Shut it, Swabbie!" she shouted.

"NAG, NAG, NAG!" I shouted back.

"You are IMPOSSIBLE!" she ranted, stomping back upstairs.

"Oh I'M impossible?" I grumbled after she was gone.

"Don't get upset, Dakota," Nico said, "She just gets like that sometimes, it's nothing personal."

"Oh no?" I asked, "I think it is!" I grabbed the last rope and swung over to where Nico was. "LIKE A BOSS!" I shouted.

"Very good!" he said, sounding a bit impressed, "Here's something for all your, err, work!"

Nico handed me a red gem looking thing. I took it and stared at it.

"What is it?" I asked him.

"Umm... twenty rupees," he said, "how do you not know what money is?" he asked.

"It's money?" I asked, still staring at the gem thing. I kind of wished Ruby was here, she could probably explain the way the money worked here.

"Er, yeah..." Nico said, "What? You don't use money? How do you DO anything then?"

"No,." I laughed, " I use money! I use this!" I a few dollars out of my pocket, which was all I had on me at the moment.

Nico took the pieces of paper from me and examined them curiously. "You pay for stuff with pieces of paper?" he asked, "That's really... weird."

"And I think your system of money is weird, so we're even," I said.

"Where are you from anyway?" he asked, "I've never heard of a country with money like this before."

"It's this great little place we like to call the," I took a breath, "U-S-AAAAA!" I shouted.

Nico jumped back a bit at my sudden outburst.

"Or the United States of America," I said, "take your pick."

"So I see..." he said, straightening his bandana.

"And we have great little things like this!" I said, searching around my pockets, I knew I had to have something modern on me somewhere, "Aha! Like I said, like THIS!" I held up my cell phone proudly.

Nico stared at the little thing in my hand. "What's that?" he asked.

"THIS my friend is one of the most awesome devices that you will ever set eyes on! This is the future of communication! This is a PHONE!" I ranted.

"Really now?" he asked, "And what can this "phone" do?"

"Well," I said, "You can take photos with it and message people through it and talk to people through it and record things with it and go online with it and- JUST SO MANY THINGS!" I continued to rant.

"Contact people how?" he asked.

"Okay so every person who has one of these little things has a number," I told him, "So you look up the number of the person you want to talk to and type it in with this," I pointed to the keypad, "Then their phone will make this little ringing sound and they'll know someone's trying to call them and they answer it and you can talk through it!"

He was staring at me with a blank look on his face. "That's complicated..." he said, sounding really confused.

"No it isn't!" I told him, "Look, I'll prove it to you! I'll just dial Ruby and-"

Then I mentally face desked. Why the heck hadn't I thought of calling Ruby earlier and asking her where she had landed? It was brilliant! BRILLIANT!

I quickly punched in Ruby's number and waited for it to ring, laughing as I imagined her expression as she walked around in her little fantasy world when her phone suddenly started blaring "Innocent Sorrow" from D Gray Man.

The phone didn't even ring. Was it dead? I pulled it away from my ear and looked at the screen. No, it wasn't dead, it was on and the screen had my background up and everything. Then I looked up in the top corner and learned something that probably would have been helpful to know earlier. There is no phone service in Hyrule.

**(Line Break)**

Nico and I arrived back upstairs. I was in a bit of a bad mood since I had thought I had finally come up with a way to get in touch with someone and then had all that go straight down the freakin' toilet.

"Hey," Link asked, "Did something happen?"

"Tired, hungry, when's dinner?" I asked, not really in much of a mood to talk.

"Dinner's in a few minutes," he told me, "What's wrong?"

"The most suckish thing in the history of sucking just happened to me," I mumbled then turned to him, "How long would it take to find a group of four people in this country?"

"In the entire COUNTRY?" he asked, "Quite a while I'd imagine!"

"That's so great," I said sarcastically.

"But you never know, it could take no time at all," he said, "especially if you know where to look."

"I have no idea where to look!" I ranted, "That's the thing! I don't have a map of this place! I don't know anything about this country! And I can't get any phone reception to call anyone!"

"What reception?" Link asked, giving me a strange look.

"Never mind!" I said.

"Look," he said, "I know you want to know what happened to your friends but you need to relax and think straight first. Come on! You're on a pirate ship for the goddess's sake! Relax a bit and have fun and then worry about your problem!" Link smiled.

Just then one of the crew members came out on deck. "DINNER'S READY!" he shouted.

I relaxed a bit. "WOOT! DINNER! SCREW LIKE A BOSS! I'M GONNA PARTY LIKE A PIRATE!"

Link laughed. "That's the spirit!"

**(Line break)**

I took my plate in my hands and sat at in a chair between Link and Nico. The latter was busy showing off the dollar bills, which I had let him keep because he seemed so fascinated by them. Besides, I highly doubted this video game world would have some dollar-to-rupee currency exchange system so if I needed money in an emergency, they weren't going to do me much good anyway.

"This money!" he ranted, "It's so weird! Oh and it smells funny too!" he sniffed one of the dollars.

"Excuse me, did I just see you SMELL that dollar?" I asked, laughing my butt off.

Nico smiled sheepishly. "Yeah!"

"Excuse me while I go underneath this table like a clam so nobody will witness me dying of laughter," I laughed, starting to slide to the floor under the table.

"But I'm telling you guys!" he continued, "Isn't this weird! I'm going to have to go to my room after dinner and record the story of the time I met this person from a far away land called Amer-i-ka!"

Some people laughed, others groaned. But in the end they all said the same thing, "NOT ANOTHER STORY, NICO!"

Nico pouted. "But why?" he asked, "A-and this money! It's amazing!"

The door creaked open and from underneath the table I was trying to get my laughing under control while starring at the bottom of the newcomer's brown boots.

"Who said money?" he asked, in sort of a high and mighty tone of voice that you might read a novel and think _Yeah, that greedy merchant there. He'd have a voice exactly like that._

I peeked out from under the table. Oh great. Let me tell you something. I hadn't played the Wind Waker or Phantom Hourglass for a while because I didn't own them, I played them at Ruby's house while I was staying over. Out of the two games, I only remembered two characters. Link, because Ruby never shut up about him, and this guy right here, because he was an absolute moron and drove me crazy throughout the entire game.

"Linebeck!" Nico said, "Good to see you up!"

"Oh come on now!" Linebeck protested, "I wasn't asleep all that long!"

"ALL DAY!" everyone shouted.

"You lazy bum!" someone added, but out of the crew members I couldn't tell who it was.

"I certainly was not!" he sniffed, "Now what was all this talk about money? Eh, kid?" he slapped Link on the back, almost causing him to choke on his drink.

"Don't look at me, Linebeck," Link coughed, "I wasn't really paying attention."

Linebeck rolled his eyes. "Oh, very well then!" he sat down in the chair across from Link and played with his fork for a bit before he looked up and noticed me staring at him. "Why is there a child under the table?" he asked.

"That's Dakota," Nico told him.

"Sup bro?" I asked.

"Yes," he said, "But why is the kid under the table?"

I grinned, thinking it would be fun to confuse the guy. "I didn't hear the question, but the answer is aliens," I said matter-of-factly.

Linebeck looked at me oddly. "Aliens?" he asked.

"Yes!" I said.

"Okay then... now why are you REALLY under the table?" he asked.

"Fool!" I said, "I was just sitting here! The aliens built the table over me! Therefore I am not so much under the table as the table is over me!"

"Wait, what?" he asked.

"Do you not know?" I asked, "The aliens built EVERYTHING! Thus proving that mankind has no creative genius of their own and must rely on the aliens for help!"

"Now that is not true!" he told me.

I shrugged. "What do I know?" I asked, "I'm a clam." Then I slid back under the table.

"What a strange child..." I heard him say.

**Author's Note:**

**If you don't know the meme "I didn't hear the question but the answer is aliens" I suggest you google it. It's a reference to a show on the History channel where this guy is always ranting about how the aliens had to do with the making of every famous structure in the world.**

**That's also a big part of Dakota's rant while she's trying to confuse Linebeck. Sometimes the real Dakota and I make fun of the show like that because we find it somewhat insulting that he's suggesting that humankind had to rely on aliens for everything and has no creative drive of their own.**

**Also, school starts back Monday so I probably won't be able to update as often or even come online as often, just a heads up so you don't think I'm totally dead. I'll come on and update when I can but I'll have a lot of homework to do so yeah.**

**Peace out til next time! ~Silver**


	22. I Have A Conversation With My Shadow

**So apparently school hasn't been taking up as much of my time as I thought it would. Or at least not yet. So anyway, even though I'm sure you don't care, I'm doing pretty well. I'm loving my Spanish class. Why? Because I'm a weird freak who loves all foreign languages. If only the rest of the idiots would shut up and do their work, it would be a beautiful thing indeed. **

**Anyway, I just had to work on this chapter right now. Why? I don't know if I have allergies or I'm sick or what but I just had to do something because if I lay down like I want to I'll fall asleep like I did yesterday and I DON'T WANNA FALL ASLEEP DANG IT! So yeah.**

**Disclaimer: ****I don't own anything but my OC's. Last I checked Zelda still belonged to Nintendo. I don't own Lya either, she's Piezelle's.**

**Chapter 22: I Have A Conversation With My Shadow (Ginger's POV)**

I slammed my head into my pillow several times and shouted while my head was still face down, allowing the pillow to muffle my annoyed scream. Why, why, why, WHY, for the love of Pete, did I have to go along with this?

I could have said no. I could have said "No, you aren't going to make a room up for me! Leave me alone and let me leave to find my friends!" I could have chased after her and stopped her before she got too far ahead, but by the time I had gotten my jaw off the ground Speed Racer had already made it back to the house and was working away.

So, I guessed when she came back up here that this was "nice" and all, but I was going to have to haul my butt out of here, pronto. She might have been ticked off if I did that but oh well, I'm in a hurry!

I looked out my window and saw that it was dark out already. God, did it just get really dark out really fast around here or had I been so ticked that I hadn't noticed what time it was?

I sighed and flopped back onto the bed. Okay fine, I would stay here for a night but only ONE night! I wasn't not falling for any of that "you should stay with us longer" crap.

I yawned and stretched. Dang, I must have gotten so ticked off I made myself tired. Oh well, if I was going to spend the night anyway, it would be pretty pointless not to get any sleep. I relaxed, closed my eyes and started to drift off. Maybe I'd wake up tomorrow, fall out of MY bed and onto the floor of MY room, and then realize that this was all just a really weird, screwed up dream.

**(Line break)**

A loud noise woke me up a few hours later. I had no idea how long I had slept but when I looked outside, it was still dark out. I have certain things about sleeping and one of those things is if it's still dark I should still be asleep.

What annoyed me even more was the fact that whatever had woke me up had interrupted the great dream I was having. I dreamed that I was back home and I was eating peanut butter... and fudge... and peanut butter fudge.

I closed my eyes and tried to go back to sleep. Maybe if I was lucky I would return to peanut butter fudge land.

As soon as I got settled, I heard the noise again.

I jumped out of the bed and grabbed my pillow, starting to make my way towards the stairs. The only problem was that apparently in this stupid fantasy world they had never heard of lamps, or light bulbs, or any other kind of electricity for that matter. So needless to say, I couldn't see the stairs all that well.

I made my way down slowly, taking it one step at a time and trying to guess where the next step would be. About half way down, I missed one and went tumbling down to the bottom.

"OW!" I shouted, "Flying fudgenuggets!"

I didn't hear anyone coming downstairs or anything and was kind of surprised that I hadn't woken anyone up.

I climbed to my feet and brushed my jeans off. God, why couldn't they hurry up and invent dust busters around here?

Once I had gotten most of the dirt off my pants, I began to look around for the source of the sound. Really, it wasn't too hard to spot.

Malon's dad was asleep in the middle of the floor and snoring... LOUDLY. How the freak did that girl put up with this lazy bum? I swear!

I picked up my pillow and lobbed it at him as hard as I could.

"Hwa! Who woke me up?" he demanded, still half asleep.

I glared at him. "Ginger is tired. Ginger was dreaming of fudge. You shut up now or Ginger will kill you."

I picked up my pillow and trudged back upstairs.

I was happy to settle in again, and hopefully Talon would stop snoring for a while.

**(Line break)**

I woke up again a few hours later to the sound of guess-what. That guy seriously needed to find some medieval Wal-Mart or something and get one of those anti-snore thingies.

I picked up my pillow again and stomped downstairs, not really caring how much noise I made or who I disturbed at this point. The whole freakin' ranch, WAKE 'EM ALL UP!

When I reached the bottom of the stairs I threw my pillow at him again.

"W-what in tarnation?" Talon shouted in alarm.

"SHUT UP BEFORE I EAT YOUR FACE!" I shouted.

I snatched the pillow off the floor and stomped back up the stairs for the second, and hopefully last, time that night.

**(Line break)**

Morning finally came (thank god). I opened my eyes, stretched, and yawned. Thankfully, I had been able to sleep through the entire night without much of a problem.

The only thing that was bothering me was the fact that some dipwad had left the window open last night, allowing the sunlight to come streaming in and blinding me as soon as I sat up.

I made a hissing sound. "I hate you Mr. Sun!" I shouted, pulling the covers over my head.

The door creaked open and someone came in, but I couldn't see who it was for obvious reasons, mainly involving my head under the covers.

"Morning, sleepyhead!" Malon said.

I felt her trying to pull the covers off me and gripped them tighter. "No! My cave!" I shouted, "Get your own!"

"Oh come on!" she argued, tugging harder, "It's past ten!"

"Pfft! Why the heck are you bothering me if it's that early?" I demanded.

"Ten's late!" she said.

"No it's early! Noon's a sane time to wake up!" I snapped.

"We've all been up since six!" she argued back, "You're so late!"

I uncovered myself. "Six?" I demanded, "You're INSANE!"

"No joke," Malon said, "Now come on, girl! We saved you some breakfast!"

"Fine," I snapped, "If it's for food, I'll get up."

Malon walked to the door and pushed it open. "Atta girl!" she said, "Just come down whenever you're ready!"

Malon walked out and shut the door behind her.

After I was sure she was gone I got out of bed and began looking for a brush or something that I could use to comb my hair out. I found one sitting on my night table. Well, at least there was SOMETHING I was used to in this behind-the-times world.

"Well, at least I won't have to walk around with bed-head all day," I mumbled, running the brush through my hair.

"Ehehe! You know, kid!" someone said, "Your hair looks funny when you first wake up!"

I jumped a mile and snatched up the first thing my hand came in contact with. "Who said that!" I demanded, "Come out here! I have a towel and I'm not afraid to use it!"

"Ehehe!" the voice giggled, "She's talking to her shadow! She must be crazy!"

"Oh great!" I moaned, looking down at my shadow and wishing that I could get it away from myself somehow, "Now my shadow's talking to me! I think I need to see some men in white coats!"

A small shape appeared out of my shadow. It was an imp like form, but it wasn't solid looking. I could see the details of the room on the other side

"Oh, don't go staring at me like that," it said, "Hasn't anyone ever told you that's rude, now?"

I blinked a few times. "You know what," I said, "When some little imp appears out of my shadow, I think that gives me a right to stare."

The shadow drifted a few feet further into the air and folded it's arms behind it's head in a relaxed position. "Meh, sure thing, hon," she said, closing her eyes and pretending to ignore me.

"So... are you a girl or a guy?" I asked randomly. I didn't really care, I just hated awkward silence.

She shot downward and floated towards me until she was in my face. "What do I look like to you?" she demanded.

I jumped back a bit. "A... girl?" I guessed.

"Bingo!" she said, jabbing a shadowy finger at my nose, "The name's Midna! Think you can commit that to memory?"

"Alright 'Midna'," I snapped, jabbing a finger at her in return, "Now get out of my freakin' face!"

She got closer to my face. "No," she said.

"Yes!" I growled, trying to shove her away. I fell straight through her and landed face first on the floor. "Owww!" I complained, rubbing my nose.

"Ehehehehe!" she laughed behind me.

I jumped up and quickly turned around, pointing in her direction. "Shut up you!" I snapped.

"Make me," she said, sounding a bit bored.

I shut up. There was no way I could think of to meet that challenge. It wasn't like I could grab her and stuff her in a sock drawer somewhere.

"I thought as much," she said. I could hear the smirk in her voice.

"Alright, alright," I said, "You've had your fun. Now why don't you go bother someone else?"

She snickered and returned to my shadow, where I couldn't see her. "Nope," she said, "I think I'm going to stay with you for a while. I find you entertaining."

"I do NOT exist for you entertainment!" I snapped.

"Too bad," she sang, "I'm staying. I'm your shadow! Say hi to your shadow!"

I sighed. "Hi stupid, dumb shadow," I said reluctantly.

"Now say hi to your knee!" she said.

"Hi kn-," I stopped short of saying it, "Nice try."

I could tell from her voice that she was shrugging. "Eh, it was worth a try."

"I'm in for a long day, aren't I?" I sighed.

"Probably," she said.

I yanked the door open and stepped out. Breakfast was sounding better than ever, and I wished I had a truckload of coffee with it to keep me wired.


	23. Dance Party in Kakariko Village

**Haha, I haven't really had much time to work on this. Sorry about the wait. Anyway, after... a few weeks, was it, and a lot of new inspirational music, I'm ready to roll again.**

**Disclaimer: ****I don't own anything but my own OC's. Zelda belongs to Nintendo and Lya belongs to Piezelle. I don't own Harry Potter, Minecraft, the Numa Numa, Peanut Butter Jelly Time, or the Ice Cream and Cake Dance either.**

**Chapter 23: Dance Party In Kakariko Village (Kevin's POV)**

I sat on a crate against the wall in one of the buildings in the village. Someone had told me what the name of this place was but I couldn't remember. All I knew was that it was something that started with a "K" and it made me think of crackers. Which reminded me, I was hungry.

The large, Native American looking guy that I had dubbed the "robot whisperer" knelt down so we were at eye level. "Tell me, child," he began, "Where is it that you're from?"

I shrugged. "Depends on why you wanna know, bro," I said, "You some kind of stalker or something?"

He looked at me oddly. "No," he said.

"Ya sure?" I asked, "Because I don't feel like telling my folks that we can't leave the house and to lock the doors and windows because there's an Indian outside waiting to scalp us or something."

"You are a bit odd, are you not?" the guy asked, standing up.

"Yes!" I said, fist pumping, "Thanks for noticing!"

"Now will you tell me where you're from?" he asked.

"Yeeeee-nope!" I answered. shaking my head.

"Please listen to him!" a girl standing over by the wall said, "My father is a kind man. He only wishes to help you!"

"This is your dad?" I asked. Then I shrugged. "Well dude, it doesn't seem like you're telling me a story... and anyone who can call off an army of robot monkeys is cool with me sooo..." I stuck my hand out for the Indian man o shake, "How ya doing, bro? Kevin Boston! I hail from the magical land of America!"

He shook my hand gently. "Ame-ri-ka?" he asked, "I'm afraid I'm not familiar with it."

"Well dude," I said, "it IS a looooong way away! And it's-" I started pointing in random directions before ending up in a knot with my arms crossed and my pointer fingers pointing in opposite directions, "-that way!"

He blinked a few times. "So tell me, Kevin was it? What brings you to our village?"

"A shiny Frisbee of light in the sky!" I told him. Well hey, I wasn't lying! Portals look like shiny Frisbees, I swear it!

"Alright then," he shrugged, obviously not going to question it. Maybe he was scared of how I'd answer if he did, "And this Ame-ri-ca, where is its location on our maps?"

"Well," I said, "Somewhere faaaaaar away! You can't even find it on your map, it's over the rainbow it's so far away!"

"I see..." he said. I could tell that he was doing a mental face palm, "What business do you have here?"

"My business is to get away from Rodger and his gang of ninja monkey, jellybean thieves," I answered, "Why? I have to come here for something to be here because if that's true you have some really screwed up rules in this country."

"No, not at all," he answered, "I was just wondering if you had something you needed to do here."

I yawned. "Well I have something that I have to do somewhere," I said, "crash."

"So I noticed," he said, "We have and extra room. Feel free to stay with us for the time being, Kevin of Ame-ri-ka."

"Thanks dude," I said, "I'm-" I was cut off as I crashed right there, leaning against a wall.

The last thing I heard before I fell asleep was someone ask another person in the room what a "dude" was.

**(Line break of doom!)**

I woke up a little while later in a bed. I sat up and looked around. The room was fairly plain and, well, let's just say it folks, it was boring looking.

"Man," I said, sitting on the edge of the bed, "These people have no taste. If it was me, I would have Minecraft posters EVERYWHERE!" I clamped my hand over my mouth. I had forgotten that the other people here were probably asleep and I hoped I hadn't woken anyone up.

I looked out the window. It was still dark but I didn't feel tired anymore for some reason. I would have laid down and tried to make myself go back to sleep but that never works for me anyway and I hate being still for too long so why even try?

I hopped up and began pacing around the room. Why was I pacing? Because it was a small room and there wasn't much else to do.

"So this is Hyrule, eh?" I asked myself, "It looks kinda big and desert-y from what I've seen. What do you think will happen if the whole country is like this, Kevin?" I asked myself.

"I think that if this whole country is a desert infested with robot monkey's I'm going to lose my mind," I answered myself, "I wish I had a laptop or an Ipod. I miss my electronics!"

"Hold up," I paused, "If there's no player to play music, then I'll just have to make my own!"

I started thinking about what would be a fun song to dance to. We danced some in music class at school and they had a lot of fun ones there but I had to make sure it was something I could sing because I wanted to have music when I danced.

After a few more moments I had the answer. "I've got it, folks! IT'S PEANUT BUTTER JELLY TIME!"

_"Where you go?_

_ Where you go?_

_ Where you go?_

_ Where you go?_

_ Now there you at!_

_ There you at!_

_ There you at!_

_ There you at!_

_ Peanut butter jelly!_

_ Peanut butter jelly!_

_ Peanut butter jelly!_

_ Peanut butter jelly!_

_ Peanut butter jelly with a baseball bat!_

_ Peanut butter jelly!_

_ Peanut butter jelly!_

_ Peanut butter jelly with a baseball bat!"_

I heard a knock at my door. I was a little disappointed that someone had bothered me, but I was a little relieved too because this song was making me hungry.

I opened the door and peaked out to see the Indian guy's daughter from earlier.

She rubbed her eyes and blinked sleepily. "Kevin," she said, "What are you doing? It's the middle of the night."

"Oh, you know!" I said, "Just dancing and getting hungry!"

"You're dancing in the middle of the night?" she asked, "Why?"

"Because I'm bored and I can't sleep!" I told her. Then I danced back into the room and started doing another dance.

_ "Ice cream and cake and cake!_

_ Ice cream and cake and cake!_

_ Ice cream and cake do the ice cream and cake!_

_ Ice cream and cake do the ice cream and cake!"_

I jumped onto the table on the far side of the room and continued dancing.

_ "Now slip, slip, slip, and slide!_

_ Slip, slip, slip, and slide!_

_ Slip, slip, slip, and slide!_

_ Stop, hold up!_

_ Tag team!"_

The girl stared at me oddly. "What is that?" she asked.

"Well I thought the lyrics would make it obvious," I told her, "It's the "Ice Cream and Cake" dance!"

"What's with those lyrics, anyway?" she asked.

"I know right?" I asked, "Why do all the good dancing songs involve food? I bet the people who write them make big bucks though! I should write one and get rich! I shall write a some about wieners and marshmallows!"

"Okay..." she said, "What are wieners and marshmallows and why choose them?"

"Because," I said, "you roast them both over a camp fire! And they taste good! See my logic now?"

"Not really," she said truthfully.

"Good!" I told her, "Now I'm even hungrier!"

I made my way over to my backpack and pulled out a Honey Bun. "Mmm!" I said after I unwrapped it, "Modern food! I'm saved!"

"What is that?" she asked.

"A little piece of awesomeness called a Honey Bun!" I said, "Want one?" I pulled out a second one.

She shrugged. "Alright," she took it from me, unwrapped it, and sniffed it curiously.

"It's not gonna bite you!" I told her.

She took a bite out of it. "Ergh," she made a face.

"What's wrong, dude?" I asked her.

"It's REALLY sweet," she said.

"I know! That's the beauty of it!" I replied.

"It's TOO sweet," she said, "How do you eat this stuff?"

"Well... what's your name?" I asked.

"Luda," she said.

"Well Luda, my friends and I have a tolerance for it," I said, "We'd be in trouble if we didn't because it's all over the place where we're from."

"Thanks for letting me try your... umm... native cuisine," she said, "But I think I'll pass."

I shrugged. "Suit yourself."

I finished my Honey Bun and was feeling much better now that I had some sugar in my system again.

"Alright," I said, "I'm good now! Let's dance!" I jumped into the middle of the floor and started dancing again, "Numa, numa, ye! Numa, Numa, Numa, ye!"

"Your native dances are interesting," she said, giving me an odd look.

"I know right!" I said, "But it's all fun and games until you dance into something. Then BOOM!"

A loud crash came from downstairs as I said "boom". It added to the effect but I really hadn't been serious about it.

"Something's going on downstairs!" Luda shouted, bolting out the door and down the hall, probably to wake up her dad. Thank you, Captain Obvious.

I left the room as well but headed straight for the stairs. I kind of wished I had a gun or some C4 or something because then I could have said that I was epic and made things go boom.

The only problem was I didn't have anything like that and had to settle with a towel from my room as a weapon. Smooth bro, very smooth.

As I approached the last few stairs, I didn't look down at who had come in. I figured that about the only thing that wouldn't make me flee back upstairs on sight was Hagrid come to tell me that I was a wizard and that I was going to go to a school and wear a stupid, pointy wizard hat.

Before I had time to consider another thing, I leaped down the last few stairs and whacked whoever it was with the towel.

"What the-" they shouted, obviously more surprised at the fact that someone had hit them with a towel than they were hurt by it.

"Get back!" I shouted, "I am an awesome kung fu ninja warrior! I have a fluffy towel and I'm not afraid to use it, mister!"

The person in front of me sighed. "You really think you're going to fight me with a towel?" they asked.

"This isn't just a towel! I have a nun chuck... or something... in it!" I replied, trying to act more confident than I felt.

"There's nothing in that towel," he told me.

"How do you know that?" I asked.

"Because you just hit me with it!" he snapped, "You dolt!"

I finally opened my eyes to see who I was talking to. The guy looked about seventeen with a blue and gold cloak on, red hair, and green eyes.

"And how do you know I didn't put a nun chuck in it AFTER I hit you with it?" I asked.

"Because I would have seen you!" he growled, "Besides, that makes NO sense!"

"What is going on down here?" someone asked, "Who are you and why are you in my house?"

"Sorry for the damages, Mr. Renado," he said, gesturing to the door.

"Yes," Renado said, "But who are you and why did you break it down in the first place?"

"Yeah!" I said, "What's this about? And if you tell me that I'm a wizard, I will hit you with that door, my little friend!"

The guy made a face and mumbled something under his breath that sounded like "insufferable peasant". He looked back at Renado and regained himself. "I am Ralph Ambi, descendent of the nobles of Lybrinna," he said, trying to make himself seem important, "and I need for the mage, Kevin Boston to come with me."

**Okay wow, that was one of the longest ones yet. I think this mostly be filler but I'm not sure because I was having a brain meltdown while I wrote this.**

**I would like you all to check the poll on my profile and see at the very top of my profile. I have a link to my journal on DA at the top and on that journal I have listed character themes and such. Feel free to comment and tell me what you think and if you want to say something about it but don't have a DA, you can leave it when you review.**


	24. A Deadly Game of Hide and Seek

**I'm back! And guess who's chapter it is today? *insert "I'm so freakin' EVIL" face here***

**Ruby: I hate you.**

**Whaaaaaaat!? You can't hate me! I-I'm your creator! That like, defies the laws of the world or something!**

**Ruby: Screw the rules, I have money.**

**Chapter 24: A Deadly Game of Hide and Seek (Ruby's POV)**

Vaati kept that annoying smirk on his face and I wanted so dearly to punch him for it. If I hadn't been so worried about the fact that a master mage (and a villain at that) had just challenged me to fight him, I probably wouldn't have stopped staring at him for a long while.

I really don't think you've ever or will ever see the real Vaati so let me tell you this. Take the most gorgeous picture of the pretty-boy, mage villain and multiply how good that looks by a hundred, you still won't even be close to how handsome the real one is.

Like I said though, I had more important things to do at the moment, like worry about keeping my head intact for the time I was here and making it out alive than how he looked. But hey, that just because I wasn't overly enthralled at the moment doesn't mean I couldn't notice!

He winked. "Like what you see, dear?" he asked. I caught a slight British accent in his voice.

Darn, I had forgotten that Vaati was supposed to be a total womanizer. "And if I said no?" I asked, trying to sound more confident than I was.

Vaati stood up from his seat and walked down the steps. His violet cape fluttered behind him and his smirk remained intact, though I would have been surprised if it didn't. He didn't halt his advance until he was standing directly in front of me.

At that point I could get a better look at him and I could tell that he was about two years older than I was, which would make him sixteen. He was also taller than I was but not to the point that I was a total ant compared to him.

He reached out and slid his hand under my chin, tilting my head up until I looked directly at him. "I'd call you a liar," he said.

I jerked my away and backed up a bit. He was a little too close for comfort now. And that's saying something because I actually don't mind people getting in my personal space unless they're beating the crap out of me or being a perv.

It was different when this guy got in my personal space. Mainly because I don't like people who could kill me touching me.

"Aww come now," he said, "You're not bad yourself... though I've seen better."

"Don't mess with me," I snapped, backing up a few steps.

"Why not?" he grinned, "It's so much fun to see how you react."

I backed up a little more. Partially because I wanted him to stop messing with me and partially because when he decided he wanted to continue with his challenge, I was far enough away to duck out of the way from whatever he threw at me.

I'm not the fastest or strongest person on earth so enough space was a crucial thing if I didn't want to get fried. If I was within such a range of him I probably wouldn't have time to move.

"Oh that's right," he said, in a tone of voice that told me that he hadn't really forgotten at all, "Our duel."

I laughed nervously and continued backing up. "Ehehe, h-how 'bout we don't?" I asked.

"No can do, dear," he sang, stepping forward.

"N-nh! How is that a no can do?" I asked, wanting to bolt for the door but seeing Shadow standing between me and it.

"Simple really," he said, "I'm not sure if anyone told you, but I was the first one to open the connection," he continued advancing, "Oh but the others, those fools, they... how shall I put it... used me. They had no interest in me once my task was done and only kept me in their alliance to keep the gate open," he gritted his teeth, "They used me as nothing more than a pawn in their game. I loathe them! I am not one to be manipulated! Do they know who I am? I am the one who controls the pawns in my own game! I am the one who the people of his country dared not speak my name! I am the sorcerer of winds that drove this entire county to its knees during one of the dark periods in history! I am Vaati!"

I wondered if I could get away while he was still talking. It was a no-go. There were no other doors and the entire time he spoke, his attention was focused on me. Even if there was another door, I'd probably be shot dead by some attack of his before I reached it.

"To be demoted like that, the disgrace of it!" he continued, "Oh but then I left. I thought by abandoning their little alliance and going off on my own, they would realize my importance. But no, they found other mages. They thought they could replace me! But I cannot be replaced by such scum from a foreign universe! "

I stepped back a bit more still.

I didn't even see him move but when I looked up again he was directly in front of me. "And that is why as soon as you and your friends arrived in this universe, you became my rivals."

I stumbled a bit, not expecting him to be that close to me that quickly.

"Well now," he said, "You should feel quite honored. It's not every day that I will admit that I consider someone a rival."

"Ehehe," I laughed, "Y-ya know," I said, "I-I think that I s-should probably clear it up r-right now that t-this wasn't exactly my i-idea."

"Oh I know," his usual smirk reappeared on his face, "But still, you're here, are you not?"

"W-well yeah," I stammered, "B-but-"

"But nothing!" he snapped, "I'll show those fools that they cannot replace ME!"

"U-ummm, I-I really don't think-"

"What?" he asked, "Well if you don't think you can hold your own against me any better than the other fools that dared to challenge me, then do yourself a favor... stand still right there AND DIE!"

I probably would have died right then and there if it wasn't for a stroke of sheer dumb luck. As soon as he attacked I stumbled and tripped over my own feet, hitting the ground as his attack went sailing over my head and left a large, black scorch mark on the wall behind me.

"Well," he said, "Aren't you a lucky one?"

As soon as I could get my balance I jumped to my feet and ran to the other side of the room, just as far away from Vaati as I could possibly get.

"Running away already, are we?" he snickered, "My, you're even more pathetic than I thought."

Another attack brushed past me, catching the edge of my jacket and burning the edge of it. I could feel the heat from the blast as it flew by. "Ah! Hot!" I shouted.

Under normal circumstances I would have slapped me a butt head if they had messed up my favorite coat but now was hardly the time.

"Oh bother," he huffed, "I missed."

I skidded to a halt and turned sharply, heading to the left when I hit the wall.

"You're cute, dear," he said, "All the running and jumping and the like. But I didn't bring you here to chase you around. I brought you here to have a duel and a duel I shall have!"

A duel, he said. That's what he wanted. Well too bad he wasn't going to get one, not from me. I didn't even know how to tap into my supposed "magic." Heck, for all I knew it could be that I didn't even have magic. Maybe they had just got their wires crossed and picked up the wrong group of kids.

Magic or no, I was screwed either way. If I had it, I couldn't use it at the moment, if I didn't have it, I was up against a guy who probably couldn't be convinced of that fact.

"Show me what you can do!" he demanded, halting his attacks for a brief moment, "After all, it's no fun to kill an opponent who isn't trying."

I reached down and picked up a metal rod that was lying on the floor. "Y-you hold off!" I said shakily, "I-I have a p-pole!"

He frowned and looked at me oddly. His face slowly broke out into a grin and he started to laugh, softly at first but then louder, tilting his head back and holding his sides.

"My, my, you certainly are entertaining," he chuckled.

"I-I'm serious!" I snapped, "I-I will hit you with it!"

"Yes," he snickered, "I'm sure you will."

The pole gave a rough jerk in my hands as if it was alive. I almost dropped it for a moment in surprise but then tightened my grip on it. The pole was jerked again, this time it went flying out of my hands and over towards Vaati, where it hung suspended in the air in front of him.

"I'm sure you would," he repeated, "If only you had held onto it."

The pole went flying back at me so quickly that I didn't even realized that it had moved until I heard the loud clatter that resulted from it hitting the wall behind me. It hit with such force that it didn't fall to the floor, it was wedged in the wall where it had broken through the stone.

I felt a sharp pain in my right leg. Looking down, I saw where it had grazed me.

It hurt like heck but I was thankful that it had only scraped by. I could have been much worse off if it had actually hit me.

"I expected more," he huffed, "Now I'm just getting bored."

He sighed and ran a hand through his long, lavender hair before looking at me with his usual smirk. "I could kill you here and now if I wanted," he informed me, "But then, that's not any fun, is it? Let's play a little game, you and I."

With nothing but open space in the large throne room, there was nowhere I could go to hide. I stared at him, wide eyed. I didn't particularly like the sound of that but something told me that once he laid out the rules, I couldn't refuse. He wouldn't let me refuse.

"How does a bit of hide and seek sound to you?" he asked, pushing the door to the room open, exposing the darkened halls of the Palace of Winds and daring me to step out, "I'll give you a five minute start, shall I? Let's see how long you can evade me, dear."

I stood there, unmoving. If I stayed here I was a goner but if I stepped out I had a chance to get out. Maybe he'd be really cocky and left a door unlocked somewhere.

"I know what you're thinking," he said, "The only way in and out of this place is to fly in by air. The exits are at such a height that if you were to attempt escape though one of them, you would meet with an extremely messy end."

I swallowed hard and began to step towards the door in full knowledge that this was a win-lose game where there was only one person playing it that could possibly win.

"Five minutes," he said, watching from back in the room as I stepped into the hallway, "I would run if I were you."

**(Line break)**

Finding a place to hide in this maze of a palace wasn't a problem. Finding a GOOD place to hide was a different matter entirely.

Vaati probably knew his own palace like the back of his hand. There wouldn't be a single hiding place he didn't know about. I already knew my chances of getting out of this were zero but the knowledge that he could find me so easily wasn't helping at all.

I started feeling sick to my stomach from the knowledge that I was playing along with no way to win. I might have lost my lunch on the floor, except for maybe the fact that I didn't have any lunch to lose. Which brought up the fact that I was getting kind of hungry, but then again, a meal isn't the first thing you think about when you're marching to a death sentence.

I was running as fast as I could through the halls. My lungs burned from it and my legs were hurting since I had been running all afternoon, first from Onox, then Shadow, now Vaati. As I rounded a corner I stopped to breath.

"Okay..." I panted, "Okay... just stop... here. I need... my second... wind."

It was chilly in the palace, so collapsing from being overheated wasn't much of a worry. However, to keep going long enough in itself was. I'm in no way a long-distance runner. I'm not the fastest person in the world. If I HAVE to run fast, I will but it's hard for me to keep it up for, say, an entire afternoon.

I bolted upright, realizing that by stopping like that, no matter how tired I was, I was losing that precious five minutes of time that I had been given. Not that it mattered, the five minutes was just another type of punishment after all, keeping me waiting for a certain fate.

I ran up the flight of stairs directly in front of me, taking two or three at a time and stumbling over my feet in my rush. As soon as I had reached the top, I ducked into a random room.

It wasn't much of a hiding place but it would have to do. Hopefully it would take him a while to reach the room I was in and give me some time to think.

It didn't take me long to notice that there was no way to lock the door. "Well, that's no good," I squeaked, grabbing a wooden chair from nearby and shoving it under the doorknob.

It would do me some good to block the door some way and I carefully looked for the sturdiest piece of furniture in the room. A large cabinet was against the wall near the door. That would be perfect! I approached the side of the cabinet and began to push.

The heavy piece of furniture moved slightly but not enough to have accomplished anything.

I could feel my heart pounding in my head, mostly because of the panic I was feeling but also a bit because of the running. I could wait until I calmed down and try again but I probably didn't have that much time and there was also the fact that I wouldn't calm down. It's hard to be calm when someone wants your head on a platter.

Turning around, I pressed my back against the cabinet and began to push again. My boots slid on the stone floor as I scrambled to keep my balance while I pushed. I wished that I had worn Converses or something with better traction. After all, these boots were made to look cool, not have good traction. Of course I don't think the people who made them were thinking that someone would be wearing them while trying to block a door from some psycho.

Finally, the cabinet started to move bit by bit. I continued with slow progress until the door was properly blocked before sliding to the floor with my back still against the wood and my shoulders burning from the effort.

"Th-there," I gasped, "That should do it."

And it did for the moment. I was safe for now, but how long the moment would last, I couldn't even guess.

**Author's Note: **

**Finally, finally, FINALLLLLLLYYYY! I have finished the chapter. I'm sorry I left you all so long. We're getting more and more work at school and I've been comming home and either reading, chatting with friends, or sleeping because none of those required any excessive brain activity. **

**I need things that don't require excessive brain activity after dealing with the idiots in my fourth period Spanish class.** **They're so loud the other teachers on the hall keep coming into class to complain about the noise. =_=;**


	25. Secret Stuff and Leprechaun Politicians

** I'm back with a new chapter for ya'll. Sorry I've been taking so long. I've had school which tends to gather in a big purple mushroom cloud and explode on me. Explode as in "That quiz was TODAY!?" Why a purple mushroom cloud? Because purple's a nice color.**

** Also I had a question regarding the age of the OCs. Ruby and Ginger are in eighth grade, Kevin and Dakota are in seventh grade, and Lya is in ninth grade.**

**Disclaimer: ****I don't own Zelda. If I did Hyrule would be a real place and I would cut school to find the Master Sword.**

**Chapter 25: Of Secret Stuff and Leprechaun Politicians**

"U-uh... hi?" I asked, not quite sure how one would go about greeting the princess of a fantasy world.

She nodded politely before turning back to Link. "I'm glad you came through," she told him.

"What?" he asked, "Since when have I ever NOT come though?"

"Have you and your four counterparts located the other mages?" she asked, dismissing his question.

"No," Green said, "I'm afraid I haven't heard from any of them since we came here. Not that I expected to hear anything from Shadow. When we got back he probably ran off, figuring he was home free."

"You shouldn't doubt your partners," Zelda informed him, "The rest deem Shadow just as trustworthy as the rest of you. Tell me, why can't you do the same."

Green shook his head. "Too much has happened," he said, clenching his fists, "What I don't understand is why you thrust him. Wasn't he still working with Vaati?"

Zelda sighed and looked down. "He must play a role in this in some way," she said, "To be honest, I wouldn't have sent him to meet the mages, but that was the other sages' decision to make, not mine."

"In other words," I said, "You don't trust him either."

"It has not matter if trust between Shadow and I exists or not," she said, "I trust in my fellow sages. If they believe that he has a significant role in this, I will trust in their decision."

"From what I've seen, you must trust your fellow sages a lot. That guy is a total jack wagon." I told her.

"We're linked by the goddess's will," she answered, "If there cannot be trust between the members of the seven sages, then what is there? Yes, the trust between myself and the sages still remains, regardless of whether or not I approve of all their decisions."

"Let's just pray they're right," I mumbled, "Anyone can make a mistake."

Zelda disregarded the last comment. I wasn't quite sure if it was because I was mumbling and she hadn't heard it or that she took it to offence.

"So," I cleared my throat, attempting to get the conversation back on track and possibly find out what we were meant to do in Hyrule, "What was so important that you wanted to talk to me about?"

"It's a plan," Green chimed, "A very roughly stitched together plan with holes and bad stitches but at least it's something to go for."

I arched a brow. "You have a plan?" I asked, "May I ask what this 'rough idea' of yours is?"

"Green and myself thought that if we could convince the guard to bring you and your friends to the castle, we could return you home sooner."

"So basically, you and your knights put out the wanted posters to round us up," I concluded, "Thank god, I thought it was the villain's alliance."

"Well, that's partially right," Green told me, "The guards did put out the posters under our direction but most of them... actually are under the impression that you're wanted criminals."

"What?" I demanded, "Why didn't anyone fill them in?"

"In times such as these, giving a large group of people the entire story can be dangerous," Zelda said, "Even if they swear allegiance to the royal family, there would be a large chance that the whereabouts of you and your friends could be leaked to the wrong hands."

"I suppose that makes sense," I sighed, "Having a lot of people know, someone could be tempted to blab."

"Precisely," Zelda nodded, "That being said, I've only given the true story to one person, my most trusted knight."

The door swung open and then quickly shut. "Pardon me, my princess. I could have sworn I heard someone mention me."

I turned to face the door. "Oh great, you again," I said.

One of the last people I wanted to see stood, leaning against the door. Cole and Ghirahim were at the top of the list so I guess it wasn't but so bad, but still, Raven hadn't left a very good impression on me last we'd spoken.

"Ah, I see miss Lya has gotten up to your quarters safely," he grinned, "Apologies for tying you earlier but having you on my horse back to the castle seeming free as a bird would be a bit suspicious."

"So I assume you were the one who was fully informed?" I asked.

"That I was," he answered, "And if you made it all the way up here, I assume Cole was minding his own business for once."

"Oh him?" I asked, "Yes thank god. That guy's a few fangs and claws short of being a horror film star!"

Raven chuckled to himself, sitting down in a chair on the other side of the room. "He's a rather colorful person, isn't he?"

"If 'colorful' was meant to indicate that he's bad crap creepy, yes. He's 'colorful'," I told him, still slightly unsettled by my previous encounter with Cole.

"Well, yes. That too," Raven said.

I redirected my attention from Raven and focused on Green and Zelda again. "Is there anything else that I should be informed of since I'm here?" I asked.

"As a matter of fact there is," Green said, "We need to sneak you out. How're your stealth skills?"

"Err... alright I guess," I mumbled, "Why is it necessary to sneak me out though? I mean isn't there less of a chance of provoking suspicion if I just stay hidden up here?"

"We'd have to get you out anyway to get you home," Green said, "Besides, you can't walk around in those American clothes. You'll attract all kinds of attention."

Green made a point. In this situation, attention was defiantly not something I desired. I should probably pick up some more Hylian-style clothing even though I was one of the most plainly dressed members of the group. I hated to think what kind of attention Ruby, Dakota, and Ginger would be attracting. Especially Ruby with her weird anime-goth style and Ginger with her orange streaked hair.

"Okay then," I agreed, "Where's our stop?"

Green smiled and nodded, apparently happy that I had agreed to go. "Kakariko village."

**Author's note:**

**DUN DUN DAAAA! So that's all I have for now. Expect a new update soon. I hope that I can get it out soon, anyway. **

**In case all of you are interested, I have a side story featuring the five OC's in the Hetaoni mansion. So if you're a Hetalian or you just want to see what further insanity will ensue, be sure to check it out!**

**YOU GUYS ARE WICKED AWESOME! *pewdiepie-esq brofist***


	26. I Kill Slenderman

**Before we start I would like to inform you all of some stuff. For starters, the real Ginger now has a account under the name of ZombiePrincessSlayer so feel free to stop by and say "hi". Also, if you have a DA account or heck, even if you don't, we have a Modern Hyrule group up there now and it's getting some artwork from Piezelle (or Lya, whichever you prefer) and I so if you're interested in seeing the character designs come over and take a look. **

**So that's it for my shameless advertizing moment. Believe me when I say, I'm not always like this. **

**Chapter 26: I Kill Slenderman(Dakota's POV)**

Being on a pirate ship was swell and all. I mean I've always wanted to be on a pirate ship and the fact that they hadn't tried to toss me overboard yet was a big plus (though I think Tetra would like to). But the thing is, I hadn't really pictured a ship like this. In my head it had been a more... One Piece-esqe ship. But, given the fact that I had been wanting to be on a ship, there wasn't really room to be picky. Especially since I was stuck here.

Another thing is that when you're from 2012 and there's no real reason to be on a ship unless you're on a cruise or something, you're used to your bedroom staying still. A ship on the middle of the ocean rocks like crazy and whether I liked it or not, I was a total land-lubber in this situation. It had taken me to fall asleep with the ship rocking around and through the bit of seasickness I was getting. When I told the other's about my little adventure, I'd make sure to leave that part out because Ruby would never shut up.

When I got tired enough I had dropped off and slept like a log. In fact I as sleeping so well after that, I was ticked as heck when the loud, ringing sound woke me up. Being a normal, technology adapted teenager from America, I immediately reached over to hit the snooze button on the alarm clock. Unfortunately, there was no alarm clock and all I succeeded in was smashing my hand against the table.

"Ow!" I shouted, holding my hand, "I hate you, table! I hate you! May you burn at my next bonfire!"

When my table rant was over, I sat up and climbed out of bed.

"Pft!" I snorted, jumping back onto the bed, "The people of Hyrule need some heaters."

Since we were in Hyrule in god-knows-what year and this world was completely technology ignorant, I doubted they had heaters. Even if they did, I doubted they'd have them on a ship. They're enough of a fire hazard when you're on land and have a place to run in case something goes screwy.

I slipped my socks and shoes on, putting my feet on the floor after I was sure they were covered. I walked around the perimeter of the room for a few minutes, not exactly sure what I was supposed to be doing.

The door creaked open a bit. "Hey, Dakota!" Nico shouted, "What are you still doing down here? Didn't you hear me ring the bell for everyone to get up and eat breakfast?"

"I thought I could slam the snooze and smashed my hand on a table," I grumbled, "Wazzes, bro. That sucked."

"O...kay?" he asked, not really understanding my rambling.

"Forget that," I said, feeling more awake, "Did you say breakfast?"

"Mm-hmm," he nodded, "And you'd better come up and get some before it's gone. We're probably going to have to stop and get more supplies sometime today or tomorrow."

"Aye-aye," I said, "Anything I should know about when we stop?"

"Just expect a night on land," he answered, "It takes a while to load the ship. It's hard work and they need all the help they can get but if you want you can sneak ou- I mean, help me observe the area."

"Observing the area sounds good to me," I snickered, "Now come on! Let's get some breakfast!"

**(line break)**

I'm used to knowing what I'm having for breakfast. You can smell it cooking or someone tells you "hey, we're having bacon!" Below deck you can't smell anything from above, especially when you're half asleep. But heck, food is food.

"GOOD MORNING, HYRULE!" I screamed as I threw open the door to the dining area, "How are you all this fine morning? Good?"

Every member of the crew was staring at me like I was some strange new species. Actually, since I was from another time and country and... let's just face it, a whole other dimension, I probably could have been.

"Good!" I said, even though nobody had opened their mouth to answer.

Link shook his head, trying not to laugh, and motioned for me to take the seat beside him.

"Link, my man!" I said, sliding into the seat, "I have a question of dire importance!"

"What is it?" he asked eagerly.

I took a breath and sang out. "Do you like waffles?"

"Pfft, what?" he snorted.

"Never you mind," I patted his back, "Just know that without waffles, you haven't truly been living all these years."

Link snickered and went back to eating his breakfast. Methinks he was getting used to my insanity.

"So," I started, "Where's Captain Failboat?"

"Linebeck?" Link asked, "Still not up."

"He'll pay for it later when he misses breakfast," I said without concern.

"Yeah," Link grumbled, "He's a lazy b- Linebeck! How are ya?"

I turned my head towards the entrance to see that the lazy sailor himself had just entered the room and was marching himself towards our table.

"Yeah, whatever, kid," he yawned, "What's to eat?"

He reached over and tried to take something off my plate. I slapped his hand and glared at him, being careful to guard my plate.

"Hey!" I snapped, "Leggo my Eggo!"

Linebeck made a snobby face. Oh wait, that's his normal face. "What are you babbling about now?"

"Call a cop we have a thief onboard!" I announced loudly enough that the entire ship turned to stare.

"You wouldn't mind keeping it down there a little, would you?" he asked.

"I refuse to shut my noise hole!" I argued loudly.

Linebeck rolled his eyes. "Someone please, shove something in that mouth of hers."

I gave him a creepy I'm-looking-into-your-soul stare. "I know you work with the aliens."

"There is something... seriously wrong with you, kid," he said, sitting down on the other side of Link, well away from me.

"Victory times over nine thousand!" I shouted, pumping my fist in the air.

"I'm the only sane person on this ship," Linebeck grumbled. He obviously hadn't meant for anyone to hear it but I interjected anyway.

"The voices say otherwise," I told him.

"Like I said," he sniffed, "I'm the sanest, smartest person on this ship."

"Oh, I'm not insane. There's only one voice," I said innocently, "That speaks English," I added.

"Oh good lord," Linebeck sighed, "I see the idiocy gathering in this room."

"I see dead people," I snickered.

Linebeck was about to reply when we heard a call from outside the dining area. "LAND HO!"

Tetra pushed her chair back and stood up. "Land's been spotted. It's settled, we're stopping for supplies."

I sighed with relief. After my night on the ship, it would be nice to be on land again and stretch my legs.

"Get ready to leave," she ordered, "We dock immediately."

**(line break)**

Land was nice after a while on the water. As soon as we docked, I had the money that I had won from Nico and I was ready to go.

"Whoa, watch out!" I said, pushing past several crew members on my way down to the dock, "Outta the way! I'm jettin'!"

"And just where do you think you're going?" Tetra demanded.

"Away," I answered, "You jelly?"

"You're not going anywhere," she snapped, "You're a temporary part of this crew and you're going to help us load the ship just like everyone else."

"I am doing something useful!" I stated, "I'm 'observing the area'!"

Tetra shot Nico a look. "She's been around you WAY too much."

As soon as she turned her head I shot off like a rocket. "I'M JUST GONNA OBESERVE THE AREA NOW! KAY? THANKS, BYE!" I shouted over my shoulder.

"HEY! YOU GET YOUR TAIL BACK HERE!" Tetra shouted angrily.

I laughed as I ran, not looking back at them to see if anyone was following. I was pretty sure that she would stay to help with loading the ship even though she was mad at me. After all, she was the captain and would have to be there to give the orders. I'd have to be sure to be back before they set sail though. I don't think my temporary captain would put a lot of thought into whether or not to leave without me.

Pleased that I had gotten away for a while, I began wandering down the street that lead through town. Now I could enjoy myself a bit and take the time to look around. I knew we were probably being tracked down and pursued but being uptight all the time wouldn't do anyone any good. When your brain's wired to be tense all the time, it can wear you out pretty quickly. Even with that being said, I knew that some members of our group were going to have a tougher time relaxing than others.

The street was lined with shops and houses. I began glancing around for anyone who might be selling anything of interest. For the love of god, it's an island in a medieval era fantasy world! There's got to be something cool out here! Maybe a weapon shop, or an armor shop! My stomach growled, reminding me that breakfast had been complete crap. I think I would have even been excited to see a food vender at this point, maybe some Hylian Micky D's.

I sniffed the air. Mmm... something smelled good. I traced the smell over to a nearby vendor and walked over to him. A pile of small cakes sat on his table and let me tell you, they looked epic!

"Something smells good," I commented.

"I'm glad you think so!" he smiled, "Would you like to try some?" He cut a small piece of one of the cakes as a sample and held it out to me.

I took the piece of cake from him and popped it into my mouth. "Mmph! Mother of freaking god! This is epicness baked into a cake!"

The man laughed. "Would you like one?" he asked.

"How much?" I asked, worried that I wouldn't have enough and that the twenty rupees that I had received from Nico would be like, two cents of Hylian money.

"Ten rupees," he said. Apparently the Hylian money doesn't go as far as American money.

"You're saying that this epicness is ten rupees?" I asked.

"Yes," he replied, "Why? You can't pa-"

"Shut up and take my money!" I cried, shoving the twenty rupees at him.

The man looked surprised for a moment then chuckled and took the money. "Pleasure doing business with you, miss."

I nodded and walked away. My ten rupee change had been placed in my pocket and I nibbled on the cake as I walked. If this piece of food could cost ten rupees, I figured that I probably wouldn't have much to afford anything else out here. Still, wandering and poking around couldn't hurt. It beat going back to the ship and getting yelled at, that was for sure.

I walked to the edge of town and sat down under a tree to finish my food, wondering if there was anything else to do around here. If these games had mini games, there might be something fun and inexpensive around here to do.

I stood up and brushed the back of my jeans off, starting back towards town. None of the signs above the buildings had anything of interest printed on them but that didn't stop me from looking. Frustrated, I was about to give up and return to the ship when something caught my attention.

"Bombchu Bowling?" I asked myself, "Well... bowling sounds good to me."

I pushed the door open and entered. Looking around, the inside looked a bit less high tech than the bowling allies back home with the electronic score boards, auto pin reset, and ball return, but really other than that it was something familiar.

"Can I help you?" the guy behind the counter asked.

"How much to play?" I inquired.

"Twenty rupees for twenty tries," he answered.

I made a face. I didn't have twenty rupees on me. "Will you take ten for ten?" I asked.

"Sure," he said, "I can do that."

I handed him the last of my money and he put ten oddly shaped things on the counter. I tilted my head a bit to look at them. Those were the weirdest balls I'd ever seen. How did they ROLL?

"What... are those?" I asked uncertainly.

"They're Bombchus of course!" he replied.

"Bomb... wha?" I was officially more confused than ever.

"You must be a first timer," he concluded, "Here, let me show you how to play."

He took and eleventh Bomb... whatever out from under the counter and stood at the end of the lane. "Here's how it works," he said, "All you have to do it aim it carefully and give it a little push. It'll go on its own after that, like so."

He aimed the thing and gave it a little push. It flew down the lane and hit the pins, exploding on contact and taking out about half of them.

I jumped back a bit, not expecting that but finding it impossibly cool at the same time. "Oh my god! I get to blow stuff up?" I asked.

"Yup!" he smiled, "Your turn now!"

I took one of the things off the counter, a bit afraid that it was going to blow up on me. Thankfully, it seemed to be made well enough that it wouldn't explode until you wanted it to.

I aimed carefully at the pins and gave the thing a little push. It skittered right into the gutter and blew up. God, this was going to be harder than he made it look.

I picked up another one and stared down the lane. The pins were plain, just back and the top was white. Wait a second! Black with a white top. I had just thought of a way to aim better.

"DIE, SLENDERMAN!" I shouted, shoving the bombchu, which went off to the side and exploded without hitting anything once again. Not that it mattered, I was going to hit those pins one way or another!

"THOSE ARE MY WORTHLESS PIECES OF PAPER!" I shouted, sending another one down the lane. It hit and cleared only one pin off the ally but I felt quite accomplished.

"There you go!" the guy shouted, "You're getting it!"

I was about to launch another one when the door opened behind me. "Hey, Dakota!" someone said, "Tetra sent me to tell you that we're loaded up and ready to leave. Sorry to interrupt your fun."

I turned towards the speaker. Link was leaning against the door frame, waiting for me to get a move on.

"Okay," I said, "I'm coming!"

"Good," Link nodded, "It's probably not a good idea to keep her waiting after your escape routine earlier."

"But that's my show stopper!" I protested, "How can you not like that?"

"Come on," he said, ignoring my question, "Tetra wants to get off soon. There's a storm coming and she wants to beat it and arrive to the mainland tomorrow."

"Why doesn't she just wait it out tonight?" I asked.

"Because she's stubborn," Link answered honestly.

I sighed. "Fine, let's go back to Captain Hook."

Link left the building with me following after and we made our way through town towards the docks. Little did we know, that storm would be coming faster than we thought.

**Alright! I'll have a new chapter up after I update my HetaOni story. I've taken to alternating between the two of these so I can keep my thoughts flowing for both. So before we close out for now, I have a few questions for you guys.**

**Is there anything in my writing style I can improve on?**

**Are there any characters that I need to do a better job of keeping in character?**

**Are there any characters that you'd like to see more of in later chapters?**

**If I write a Yume Nikki story with the OC's after I finish my ongoing stories, would you read it?**

**AND FINALLY:**

**Do you like trains? :3**


	27. Bacon Knives and Other Oddities

**I know I've been taking freaking forever to update but I've had a crap ton of school stuff. Hopefully now that progress reports have come out it'll slow down for a day or two for me to start writing again. I'll probably get more done on my stories and my manga work now. **

**Anyway, now that my personal complaints are done, I've been going through my list of stories for a while and deciding what to work on/rewrite/delete. I think It might be about time I cleaned out my stories there are just some I'll never work on again like that TMM one. I hadn't seen TMM in so long, I totally screwed up the characters. Just stuff like that, none of my major projects like this or my Hetalia story.**

**In addition, I'm also working on the plotline for a sequel to Modern Hyrule since people seem to like it. I have a basic outline but as for planning, I think basic is as far as I'll get since I'm one of those people who just plops down at the computer and writes whatever nonsense spews forth. I also have several ideas for new stories I'll be starting later on after I finish some of my current ones. Two major projects is enough for the moment but when I finish one of them, I'll start on the others.**

**And thus concludes Sliver Neko Baka's progress update of awesomeness!**

**Disclaimer: ****I don't own Zelda. **

**Chapter 27: Of Bacon Knives and Other Oddities**

The cold water snapped me awake as I splashed it on my face. On a normal day, I'd just stay half asleep until my body decided to feel more awake. Today however, I was going to be as awake as I could possibly be.

Usually if a little imp flew out of my shadow and told me to say hi to my knee I'd either go back to bed and assume I was still dreaming or I'd go to a doctor and try to get some meds for my insanity even though I HATE going to doctors. But since everything else in this place was just as screwed up, I assumed that my brain was just fine. Or at least, all it needed was some duct tape.

It was hard to assume otherwise when said imp was floating in the corner of my room, staring at me like I was an idiot. I turned back to what I was doing and tried to ignore her but it's hard to ignore someone who's staring directly at the back of your head.

"Shut up," I told her.

"Well that's rude," she snorted, "I didn't say anything."

"You're eyeballs are screaming at my head," I informed her, "Shut up."

"Whatever," she sighed, though I could hear the amusement in her voice.

I was about to snap back when I heard a growling sound. A sound, which happened to be my stomach. I suddenly remembered what Malon said about breakfast.

"Look, 'whatever' all you want," I snorted, "And shut your eyeballs up. I'm going to eat."

**(Page break)**

The one thing I will say about Midna is that she AT LEAST had enough since to return to my shadow before I got to the foot of the stairs. I didn't much care to explain to people why there was an imp floating behind me.

"Oh hey!" Malon chirped, "You're here! Come and get some food before it's gone."

I yawned and stretched. "Do you have bacon?" I demanded.

"Er... yeah, why?" she asked.

"Oh thank god," I sighed, "I didn't get up for nothing."

I sat down at one of the wooden chairs surrounding the table and put several strips of the bacon on my plate. There are only two things I'll get up for in the morning, bacon and chocolate chip pancakes. If you tell me to get up because you have them, you'd better actually have them because if you don't, you die.

I sat back and started chomping my breakfast. I'd be sure to be gone soon after but seriously, who doesn't stop for free food? While I was thinking about free food, I absentmindedly nibbled my bacon into a point. I moved it away from my mouth and was wondering if it was possible to put someone's eye out with it, when Malon used the dreaded line on me.

"Are you leaving today?" she asked, "You should stay longer."

"Nope," I said, my speech muffled by the food in my mouth, "Ain't gonna happen."

Malon opened her mouth, probably about to ask 'why not', when we were both distracted by a loud banging sound from outside.

"Oh, someone's at the door," Malon stated.

Thank you, captain obvious. 'At the door' was probably the understatement of the century considering that whatever they were doing wasn't so much knocking as it was trying to tear the door down.

"Oi! Open the door!" the person snapped, "I've spent all night looking for that annoying chick! Open the freakin' door!"

I made a face, recognizing the voice. God, would it KILL him to chill out every once in a while?

"Oh, don't open it," I mumbled as Malon stood up to get the door.

"What?" she asked, "Why not?"

"Because that's what he wants," I said bluntly.

"Hey, you in there!" he shouted, "Quit telling people they can't open the door for me!"

"Shut up!" I snapped, "You're the one screaming at the door! Your opinion is invalid!"

"MY OPINION IS VALID!" he growled.

"Malon, why don't you come back to the table," I changed the subject.

She sat down beside me rather uneasily. "God, is he alright?"

"It's a stray," I said, "Just ignore it and don't feed it and it'll go away."

"I'M NOT A CAT!" he protested from outside the door.

"It's very determined," I stated, taking a sip of milk.

The banging paused and everything was boringly quiet again. I hadn't really expected ignoring him to work but I wasn't gonna complain.

"Told you," I said, picking the pointy piece of bacon up again.

There was a tapping sound at the window and I glanced up to see the blue Link pushing the window up and looking pretty ticked off. He stumbled through the opening before catching his balance and crossing his arms.

"I was out there ALL NIGHT trying to track your sorry butt down! And believe me, it wasn't because I wanted to!" he ranted, "Now you listen up-"

"Talk fast before I cut you with my breakfast," I cut him off, gesturing to him with my bacon knife.

Most people who knew me probably would have been just a bit disturbed. Blue however, pulled up a chair and started helping himself to our food. Apparently I hadn't affected his appetite at all.

"Hands off my breakfast, bub!" I snapped.

"It wasn't on your plate," he shrugged, lifting some eggs into his mouth with his fork.

"It was in my personal bubble," I argued, still pointing my bacon at him. My personal bubble is somewhat larger than other peoples, but you get the point.

Blue raised an eyebrow and made a rude face before reaching over and taking the bacon out of my hand. He wiped it on his napkin and popped it into his mouth where it disappeared in one bite.

I stared him for a moment with my mouth open. "You stole my food!" I shouted in outrage.

"And?" he asked, "If you didn't want me to eat it, you shouldn't have kept pointing it at my face!"

"You STOLE my food!" I repeated, "I can't believe it! That bacon is holy! That bacon is WASTED on you, mi amigo!"

Blue snorted in an irritated manner before pouring himself a glass of milk and taking a few gulps. He wiped his mouth on the sleeve of his tunic and pushed his plate away, seeming to be in no hurry to tell me whatever he had to tell me earlier.

"And now you're gonna just sit there looking smug?" I demanded, "It's ON, man! En garde!" I shouted splashing my glass of milk at him.

Blue moved away quickly, leaving the area open so the milk splashed over the floor behind him instead. Malon was probably less than pleased with me at the moment but hey, when it's on, it's ON!

"You have lousy aim," he grunted, pushing his chair in, "Now shut up and listen for a minute would you!"

"Never! You defiled my breakfast food!" I hissed, shaking my fist at him angrily.

"For the love of Nayru!" he grumbled, grabbing my jacket and pulling me out of my chair.

"Hey!" I protested, kicking him in the shin, "You see this bubble? You do not enter the bubble! I'll shoot you like a zombie!"

He opened his mouth to make another smart remark, when another knock at the door made us both look up.

"Sorry to interrupt," the person on the other side said, "But did you forget about me, mini me?"

Blue gritted his teeth and unlocked the door for his companion. "If you call me your 'mini me' again ONE more time I'll-"

Matt... err... other Link stretched his arms above his head and yawned. Not that I could blame him much, I wasn't exactly a morning person either.

"What should I call you then?" he asked, still slightly asleep, "I call all the little me's running around 'mini me'."

"Call me by my name you loser!" Blue growled.

"What? 'Link'? We're all Link so isn't that kind of confusing, mini me?" he asked.

"CALL ME 'MINI ME' AGAIN! I DARE YOU!" Blue growled.

I sat back down at the table and started eating again, hoping to get down a little more bacon since Blue had eaten mine. They seemed pretty wrapped up in their conversation so hopefully it would take a while before they noticed me again.

"-explain it to her." Link finished.

I turned my head a bit, realizing that the conversation had transferred from 'mini me's to me. "What about me?" I asked.

"Explain the situation to you," he nodded, "I'll do it since my mini me apparently can't stop arguing."

Blue crossed his arms and mumbled something about not being Link's 'mini me'. "I'll wait outside," he said plainly, allowing the door to swing shut behind him as he left. Malon and Talon left shortly after to check up on things around the farm.

"Now, where to start," Link sighed, running a hand through his hair.

"How about you start with what the h.e. double hockey sticks I'm doing stuck in this stinking farm?" I demanded.

"...Staying with Malon?" he asked.

I face-palmed. He apparently didn't know why I'd been transported to the farm in my landing. I'd sure as heck like to know but there was no point in bugging him if he had no idea either.

"I'll just take it from the beginning," he said, leaning back in his chair and stretching his legs out. God, he was laid back when he came out of big-shot hero mode. "Now class, questions come after our discussion."

"Yeah, yeah," I said, waving my hand at him, "Just get on with it."

"Alright, I'll start with what happened back at the park after you five fell through," he stated, "There's not much good in filling you in on everything else without letting you know how I got back here.

I sat and waited for him to get to the actual informational portion of this talk. Obviously, he was the kind of person who didn't like explaining things.

"As probably guessed, I got in a pretty bad fight after you and your friends left. Ghirahim's a strong opponent. I've never met the incarnation of the hero who eventually defeated that demon, but he must've been God or something," he paused, realizing that he was getting off track, "Anyway. back on the topic. Within a few minutes of the battle, I realized that I was getting my tail kicked pretty badly so I jumped through the link as well. I'm sure the purple me explained that it'll stay open until you close it so there's no wondering about that. I was pretty bad off and had a rough landing down in the Kokiri Forest. When I woke up another one of my me's Kokiri friend had taken care of the injuries. As for Ghirahim, I'm almost certain that he followed me through. I can't say for sure where he landed though, transporting by portal is unpredictable that way."

"Well," I said, "That's all fine and dandy about you but what about us? In case you haven't noticed, we don't BELONG here! Not even Ruby belongs here and she's OBSESSED with the Zelda crap!"

"I knew that was coming eventually," he sighed, reaching over to the table and pouring himself something to drink, "If you're wondering about the others, I don't know where they landed either. Nor do I know where my mini me's counterparts are."

"DON'T CALL ME 'MINI ME'!" Blue shouted from the other side of the door.

Link winced at the sudden raise of volume and went back to his explanation. "Zelda and I have scouts out looking for them but nothing's turned up so far."

"Scouts?" I asked.

"Fairies," he clarified, like it was a totally normal thing to have fairies scouting for your best friends.

"Of course," I sighed, "Because that makes total sense."

"We'll know as soon as they find anything," he said, "fairies travel fast and sense energy. That's why they make such great scouts," he took a sip of his drink and set his glass back on the table, "As for why we're here, we need you to travel with us for a while."

"Travel? With him?" I asked pointing to the door, "No way!"

"You say that now, but you're setting yourself up as a target here," he informed me, "Staying in one place gives the bad guys in all this something to lock onto. If you travel with us, we can keep moving and make you harder to track."

I thought it over for a moment. "Fine. I'll travel, but I won't be happy about it."

"Atta girl!" he said, straightening up in his chair, "I'll ask Malon to saddle up another horse and-"

"Whoa, whoa!" I said, "Saddle a horse? I don't know how to ride a horse! I don't even like horses!"

"In that case," he said, rising from his chair and smoothing his tunic, "I'll ask her for some lessons as well. It seems the three of us will be staying here just a little longer."

"Joy..." I mumbled. And after I'd sworn I wouldn't stay any longer too!

"How nice!" Midna said, appearing out of my shadow, "All my servants are gathered here at once! Ehehe!"

Link jumped back and stared for a moment before regaining himself. "M-Midna!" he shouted.

"What? You KNOW this twerp?" I asked.

"We're... acquainted," he replied, fiddling with the collar of his tunic.

Midna drifted over to him and sat on his shoulder. "Well now that we all know each other," she started, "Chop, chop! Get a move on, Wolf-Boy!"

"Huh?" he asked, "Uh, yeah, right!" he said, heading outside to ask Malon about the lessons.

Minda promptly disappeared into his shadow, which was a relief to me since I would have to deal with the little twit anymore.

What wasn't a relief was that I was stuck on the farm AGAIN, receiving lessons that I didn't actually want, AND I was stuck with Blue again! I stared at the closed door for a moment before standing up and turning to the stairs.

"I'm going back to bed..."

**(Author's note)**

**I'll start on Kevin's POV soon. I promise I won't take so long to update again. I actually finished this chapter on 2/20/12 but I wasn't able to upload it because we'd hit the cap on our internet. **


	28. I Go Swimming For Jellybeans

**Hey guys! Wow, I'm late again. I'm sorry for that. I'll try to update more often. I'll have more time this summer for sure. **

**Exam week has just passed for me (thank god). So, yeah, that's a load off my mind. I'll be working on this more over the summer. I'm going to try and keep myself from being distracted as much so I can update faster. I really mean to update sometimes and then it's just like "Ooooh! Look at this! Wait... what was I doing again?" **

**I think I've about figured out this new word processor as well. I had MS Word before. Then my computer got a bad virus so the people at the shop had to restart it from scratch and they put a different program on it. Which I've been trying to figure out. (I still can't find the "strike text" button...). Ignore me. I might not seem like it, but I'm technologically challenged. **

**Disclaimer:**** I don't own Zelda. If I did, this wouldn't be on FanFiction, now would it?**

**I Go Swimming For Jellybeans (Kevin's POV)**

I bounced along beside the pointy hat guy, taking a few jellybeans out of my bag and popping them into my mouth. What was this guy's name again? Ralph? How come everyone around here got a weird name except him? Where was his weird name, man? I should ask him.

"Ralph?" I grinned, walking a little faster.

"What?" he sighed, looking annoyed.

"Why is your name so normal?" I asked, "Everyone around here has weird names like 'biisueiwue' or something. But not you. You're just Ralph."

"Just..." Ralph twitched, "...Ralph? I am not 'just Ralph'! I am a lord in my country, peasant!"

I turned around and began walking beside him backwards. It's no fun to just walk forwards. If you do that you can see what's coming and that's no fun. It was too bad we were in the grass. I had my heelies on but you can't roll in grass.

"I don't like grass," I stated.

Ralph stared at me like I'd just asked him to go to candy land and hunt purple narwhals with me. "What are you going on about now?" he demanded.

"I don't like grass," I repeated, "You can't roll in it. We should ban it. Like Mondays. We should ban those too."

Ralph's stare became more annoyed and confused as the seconds ticked by. "You make no sense," he growled, pushing some of his red hair out of his face, "What do you mean you can't roll in grass? Of course you can! Just lay down and roll. Actually, PLEASE lay down and roll away."

"No dude! I don't want to roll like that. It makes me itch," I said, "It's impossible to the over nine thousandth power to roll how I want to roll in grass!" I exclaimed, waving my arms to emphasize the point.

"You can roll in grass!" he argued, "Lay down and roll already and get it over with! We're late enough as it is!"

"Can you roll?" I asked.

Ralph gritted his teeth and gripped his hat, pulling it down over his eyes and ears in an exasperated manner. "No!" he snapped, pushing the hat back up on his head.

I shrugged, fishing out a red jellybean. "Want some?" I asked.

"Are they making you act like this?" Ralph glared.

"Highly possible," I snickered.

"Then no," he huffed, "I will have none of your magic beans!"

"You're loss," I shrugged, popping the jellybean into m mouth, "You probably couldn't handle this much awesomeness anyway."

Ralph opened his mouth to shoot off another comeback but fell silent and just gave me an annoyed glare. It looked like he was just figuring out what everyone else I'm around knows already. And that would be, 'it's not worth it'.

"Just... entertain yourself or something!" he snapped.

For the next few minutes we walked in awkward silence. Awkward silence and I don't get along. In fact, we've been mortal enemies from day one. It thinks it can mock me with its awkwardness!

"Boing!" I chirped.

Ralph immediately tensed and turned around slowly to look at me. Apparently he'd thought we were done. Obviously, he doesn't know me. If he did, he'd know we're never done!

"What are you doing now?" he demanded, in his usually whiny, snobby tone.

"I'm entertaining myself!" I told him, "That's what you wanted, wasn't it?"

"I meant quietly!" he growled.

"Impossible, can't happen," I shook my head.

"Hey kid," he snorted, "Nothing's impossible."

"You know I have some insight on that," I began.

"Oh goddess," Ralph huffed, looking raising his eyes to the clouds in a 'why would you do this to me' kind of way.

"Whoever said that never tried to nail Jell-O to a wall or slam a revolving door," I concluded.

Ralph shook his head and kept his pace. He'd been walking the entire time I was making my brilliant analysis. He'd probably been hoping that I'd get caught up in my genius and forget to follow him. Too bad I can walk and analyze at the same time. The brilliant are like that.

I was still marveling over my awesome brain when Ralph's dorky, blue self stopped dead right in front of me. You should never stop if front of someone thinking brilliant things brilliantly. It might cause them to run into you and lose their awesome thoughts.

"Oof!" I exclaimed, running into his back.

The material on his cloak was flying in the wind. It was flying epically, might I add. Unfortunately, it was flying in my direction. Suddenly, all I could see was blue.

"Agh! Your cape is eating my head!" I shouted, flailing and grabbing at the material in an attempt to untangle myself from it.

"Stop flailing around!" he snapped, tugging at the collar of the cloak, "You're going to strangle me!"

The red-head undid the fastener on his cape. Which was good... for him. I, however, was still being eaten alive by the cloth.

"Great job!" I said, "Now it's eating the rest of me too!"

"Not my problem!" he huffed.

"Actually, it is your problem," I told him, "I'm not going to follow you very far with your head-eating, zombie cape attacking me!"

"For the love of god," he groaned, taking the cape in his hands and starting to untangle it, "Stop moving!"

"Nailing Jell-O to a tree!" I reminded him.

"Would you stop!" he ordered, "You're just making it worse!"

I raised my hands above my head and grinned. "I'm a bluuuuuue ghooooooost!"

"Now you're just being ridiculous!" he growled.

Somewhere in the struggling, he must have pulled a bit too hard. The cloth tangled around my feet gave a yank and I stumbled into him. Being as frazzled as he already was, he didn't have his balance very well.

"You're knocking me over!" he exclaimed.

Before I could answer, there was a splash. The cape was still eating me and I was soaked. Taking advantage of it's light weight, I ducked under it and surfaced with myself officially free of it's evilness.

"Pah!" I gasped, "Look! I'm back!"

"Joy," Ralph rolled his eyes, plopping his now wet hat back onto his head.

We floated in the middle of the lake for a few moments in awkward silence. Ralph glanced around for a moment.

"Where's my cape?" he said suddenly.

"The world may never know," I shrugged, reaching for my jellybeans, "Wait... No! My jellybeans!"

"Who cares about your magic beans!" he groaned, "My cape!"

"My candy..." I sighed.

I glanced around, looking for my bag of jellybeans and praying that the Loch Ness Monster hadn't eaten them or something. Soon a spotted a plastic sandwich bag floating the opposite direction.

"My precious!" I cried, splashing after the long-lost food in a hurry. I quickly took hold of the baggie and yanked it from the water. "Haha! I have done it!" I exclaimed triumphantly.

On closer inspection, however, I found that things hadn't really gone off like I'd planned. The bag was upside down. And open. In other words, there was a rainbow pouring out of it into the lake.

"No! How dare you!" I shouted at the bag, grabbing wildly for the jellybeans before they could sink, "Don't you drown on me!"

I shoved what I could back into the bag, watching in dismay as the rest of my candy sunk. I would say it met it's maker, but unless the guy who invented Jelly Belly drowned, I don't think the phrase would be very appropriate.

Ralph grabbed me by the wrist and began to haul me out of the water. "Come on! We have a time to make!"

"No!" I shouted, flailing after the sinking candy, "I must save them!"

"Oh good god..." he grumbled, successfully pulling me onto dry land.

His hat momentarily flopped limply over his eyes and he pushed the wet thing back so it dangled down his back. The wet cloak, which had been recovered at some point in the history of the madness, was slung over his shoulder. He didn't seem too big on the idea of putting it back on at the moment.

"How dare you take me away from my friends!" I scolded him.

"Hey! Not my problem!" he muttered, "We needed you away from Kakariko so that we could-"

"Not THEM!" I corrected him, "My-"

"If I hear one more word about your magic beans!" he groaned.

"They taste more like the rainbow than Skittles," I told him, "Skittles has no blue."

"That's it!" he started, rising to his feet.

"TASTE THE RAINBOW!" I shouted, dashing towards the wooden bridge over the lake.

When I hit the bridge, I stood on my heels and allowed my heelies to do the work. At last! I could finally roll! Take that, Jell-O!

"WHOO!" I shouted, picking up speed as I rolled, "I'M ROLLING LIKE JELL-O IN A TREE!"

Ralph ran behind me in an attempt to keep up. I wasn't sure if he was still mad about the candy issue or if I was just going too fast for him. Either way, he'd get over it... eventually.

"So that's rolling..." he mumbled.


	29. Final Confrontation

** Thanks for sticking with me on the story even though I've been having my random hiatus moments lately. I really appreciate it. **

**Disclaimer:**** I don't own Zelda no matter how much I wish I did. I wish I own a lot of things I don't. Like a million dollars, cosplay, Pepsi, and Batman.**

**Chapter 29: Final Confrontation (Ruby's POV)**

My back and legs began to ache as I curled myself ever tighter into the corner. I didn't know how long I'd been here. Probably not long at all, but it felt like I'd been hiding for hours. The blockade I'd put up at the door gave me a small sense of comfort. Though I knew Vaati well enough from the games to know that if he really wanted something, no amount of crap piled in front of a door would keep him out for long.

Despite my desire to stay as small as humanly possible, tucked up in the corner, I couldn't hold this position any longer. I'd been too crunched up for too long. It was uncomfortable. As foolish as it may have been, granting myself comfort at the expense of my personal since of security, I allowed myself to uncurl. I stretched my legs, which were feeling much better now that I was no longer compacted into a human cube.

Blinking a bit and taking a moment to observe the room, which I hadn't the time for at the moment of my panic, I noticed the light entering from the far wall. I took my shoes off, leaving them in the corner and rising to my feet as slowly and quietly as possible. The sock-clad feet met the stone floor with a muffled sound. Barely audible, in fact, unless you had ears like a dog. However, fear has a tendency to make one aware to even the slightest of noises. For every step taken, I winced, wondering why socks had to shuffle so much. Though the feeling was likely from my current alertness to sound.

Slowly but surely, I approached the window. This was most certainly the source of the light. I had no way of knowing what floor I was on off the top of my head, but with this, if I was near the bottom, I could likely climb out. Loosening the lock, the window was cracked a bit. Peeking out ever so slightly, the fact that I was more than a little ways off the ground became immediately apparent.

I didn't take time to shut the window. There seemed to be no point in that course of action. If Vaati found me here and made his way through the block at the door, the last thing on either of our minds would be an open window. Unless he wanted to throw me out the window. However, although that was a very realistic possibility, I highly doubted he'd need the invitation of an open window to do so. He'd simply open it himself.

If I had the time, I'd have quickly left and made for lower ground. Perhaps then I could climb out a window at a safe distance from the ground. Unfortunately, leaving now would be suicide. So would jumping out the window. Saying here was also, likely, a death wish. It was suicide all around no matter how you looked at it.

And that was if a bottom floor even existed. The wind mage himself had said that there were no ways in or out except by air. I would have liked to have believed that it was simply a statement to discourage any attempt to escape. But on the flip side of that coin it was a truth and a big gamble. A gamble that I wasn't willing to take. Gambling with life seemed stupid even if the person in question was going to die anyway.

The slight scuff of a heel on the stone floor outside made me turn my attention back to the door. I tensed immediately, a slight chill running through my body from the scare and then quickly fading into something more hot before disappearing completely. I backed to the wall, putting as much distance between the door and I as I could.

I heard the scuffling steps pause. A moment of silence. Terrible silence. Where was he? Had he turned and walked the other way? I couldn't relax myself. Not yet.

A dryly humored chuckle sounded from the other side of the door. And in a soft voice, obviously intended to hold a sense of mocking reassurance, though it still carried a noticeable commanding tone, he spoke to me. "Found you."

I gripped my burnt coat tightly to my body until my knuckles were snow white. He couldn't have gotten it right so soon. He had to be talking to another door! It was wishful thinking. Hopelessly wishful thinking. The facts were obvious, he had my door and he would be inside in a moment.

I had to hide. Hide anywhere! The sound of the door creaking open met my ears and the heavy, wooden object slid to the side with seemingly no effort. Though, thinking on Vaati's undoubtedly high rank as a mage, I doubted he'd ever touched it to move it.

And enter he did. His overbearing presence trailing behind him. The sorcerer's violet cape fluttered behind him in the slight breeze that seemed to follow along him everywhere. Red eyes flashing in the light from the moon provided from the window, he shot me an indescribably sinister grin. "Tag," he hissed with amusement, "You're it."

* * *

><p>The hand shot out before I could react, seizing me by the collar of the shirt and holding it's grip tightly. The door slammed shut with a loud "BANG", followed by the small click of a lock as the furniture slid back in front of it.<p>

"I win," he smiled, tugging me ever closer to his face until we were almost nose to nose, "You remember what happens when I find you, don't you?" the mage cooed, "Don't you? I want to hear you say it."

Roughly, I was flung to the side, hitting my head on the low base of the wall. I hissed in pain and pulled my hands over my throbbing head.

"What was it?" he asked with mock innocence, pulling me up again, "When I find you, you...?"

My eyes were squeezed shut as I waited fro my head to stop pounding. My head didn't stop. And it wouldn't stop for a very long time. I could feel the blood rushing and hear my heart pounding in my ears. Thumping at the same rhythm as the pain from hitting my head.

"I-I..." I choked, feeling my throat tighten. I was going to die. REALLY going to die! No second life, no respawn. I was going to DIE!

"Yes?" he asked, "You what?"

Being trapped in this room. The other mage gripping me by the collar, demanding I tell him that I was going to die. And then just that. The feeling. The terrible sinking feeling you get when you know you're going to die. When you know there's nothing you can do about it. I couldn't... I couldn't!

And then nothing. My head was blank, completely blank just for a moment, followed by the oddest sensation that I'd fainted for a moment and was just coming to now. The first sound I heard, the sound that assured me that I wasn't dead, was an annoyed grunt from the violet mage.

I'd tell you that my eyes opened, but really, I don't think I'd ever closed them. There had been nothing for just a moment, and then everything at once. Yet I knew for a fact that I had my eyes open beforehand and had never closed them in the time of the blank-out.

Vaati's grip loosened, allowing me to fall to the floor. He ran a thumb over his pale cheek, wiping the small line of red from it and examining it for a few moments before licking the substance off of it. "So," he said, "You do have magic."

I scrambled back til I was pressed to the glass of the window. Magic? I hadn't done magic! I'd passed out or something! Though I admit that I didn't know where that scratch across his otherwise flawless face had come from, I certainly wasn't the cause of it!

The wide smirk planted itself back on his face. Although, now with a more twisted air about it. "Show me more," he demanded.

"I-I-!" I began.

"I know you can do it," he argued, his tone hardening, "I see it. Show me your magic. Fight me!"

"I-I didn't-!" I started once more, only to be cut off again.

"Oh?" he asked, "Yes you did. And I fully intend to see it once more."

I backed up more, the coolness of the glass making it's way thought my thin coat and the back of my shirt. Vaati however, advanced slowly. Step by step. Slowly. Intimidatingly.

I pressed back further. The coolness became more apparent. And then suddenly, it disappeared. There was nothing. No feeling, no support. Just open air. The world tilted as the already open window parted. And then there was feeling. The feeling of the air rushing by as I pitched downward and of my throat stinging as I shouted my way down.

And there, hundreds of feet above the ground, I fell.


	30. In Which There Is A Train

** Am I the only one who thinks the summer went by in record time? I'll be back at school next week. Or this week, by the time I post this. My internet's out again. We were actually going to get better internet but then they let us get so freaking far with the set up, then proceeded to inform us that we couldn't get it. So that sucks. But on a brighter note, my birthday was the 9th! I officially now own the Hyrule Historia, courtesy of Dakota, or TheMedicSoldier for those of you who have seen her about up here. And this really sweet Master Sword my parents got me. So I'll be Link for my third Halloween this year and my cosplay will finally be complete. Which is good, because I have more time to think on how I'll pull of my Scarecrow (from Batman) cosplay for next year. **

**Be warned, there is a lot of talking in this chapter. But that's nothing different. If you were to look though this story again, you'd notice that most of the writing is dialogue anyway.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own the games. NOW LET'S ZELDA!**

**Chapter 30: In Which There Is A Train (Lya's POV)**

"Kakariko?" I asked, arching an eyebrow at Raven, "Well, that's all very nice considering that everyone both inside and outside the castle wants to throw me in jail. Helpful or not, that's going to complicate things a bit. " Raven had been going along with it, and though it was necessary for their plan, it hadn't really helped me out much at all since it would look really shady for him to be hanging around with me now.

"Ah," he sighed, running a hand through his blond hair, "Come now, miss Lya. You're not going worry about the little things for the rest of our journey, are you? That will make the travel even more difficult than they are."

Green crossed his arms. "Come on," he prompted, "It's not like you're going to have to sneak there alone. Raven and I are going along to help you navigate. Besides, we know more about the area than you do."

"I guess that's true," I admitted. I had played the games, but these two lived here. That definitely would mean they knew more about Hyrule than any gamer could ever hope to know.

"So then what's the problem?" Green asked, "Stick close to us and keep your hood up. People won't question you much if you're with us."

"Well, maybe not," I replied, "But what about the cloak? Do I really have to keep wearing it for the entire time I'm here?"

"In Hyrule?" Raven asked, "I should think not. The people in Kakariko aren't a very nosey lot. Word tends to move slowly out there anyway, I doubt many of our fliers have made it to the village."

I tugged my hood up, making sure it was covering my face well. Hopefully, it was doing it's job well enough that Cole wouldn't be too nosy when we made our way out of Zelda's room. "If that's the case then we should probably hurry over there," I said, "I have a feeling that the people here are more nosy than the ones outside."

"Right you are," Raven admitted, "It was a big gamble bringing you up here. Especially with Cole about. Not to mention the captain of the guard. That man's a snoop, he is."

"If the three of you are heading out that way, then you should locate one of the passages," Zelda suggested, "It would be much easier to exit unnoticed if you didn't use the main door and go through the town."

"Passages?" I asked, "Sounds like a plan."

"You're not coming with us, Zelda?" Green inquired, tilting his head a bit.

The princess gave a short, light laugh and answered. "While the proposition of another adventure is tempting, I'm afraid I must decline. There's much here that I must attend to. At the moment, my duties at the castle concerning the village and seeking information on the alliance of the villains is top priority."

"But if you came with us, you could help us stop them," Green argued, "Wouldn't you rather be out doing something than sitting in here at a stuffy desk?"

"I would," she admitted, "But I am doing something, Link. And I can do much more to help by directing things here. Things are fragile with the alliance on the opposing side growing bolder every day. If I wasn't here, things would fall apart. Cole is capable of directing the castle but I would, as anyone else would, only trust him with things that did not concern the rise or fall of the country."

Green sighed. "When you put it like that, I get it. I wouldn't trust Cole either."

"Now that that's reached it's conclusion, the three of you had better be off," Zelda nodded.

"Then by all means," Raven spoke, tugging the door open and holding it, "Shall we go, miss Lya?"

I nodded a brief goodbye to Zelda before turning and making my way out the door. I checked my hood one last time to make sure it was in place and started down the hallway.

Raven moved in front of me and led the way while green walked beside me. Considering the fact that I had no idea where the passages were, I had no problem with him leading us.

"You nervous?" Green asked.

"I'd be an idiot if I wasn't," I told him, "I'm glad I get to see Hyrule but I really wish we were visiting under better circumstances."

"So would I," he replied, "We have to work with what we've got though. And I don't see your circumstances getting a whole lot better until we get you back to America and close this link up."

"I know," I sighed, "It's still irritating though."

Raven paused in front of a bare wall and glanced around. "You two don't hear anyone coming, do you?" he asked.

Green and I shook our heads. For the floor where the princess was located, security was pretty lax. They were probably all looking for their 'wanted criminals' or out gathering information.

"This is a dead end," Raven said, "Nobody much bothers to patrol a dead end, so it's a brilliant place for this."

Raven tugged one of the torches on the wall, which slid down slightly. The wall slid away just a crack and he wedged his hand into it, pushing it back the rest of the way. It moved surprisingly easily for a stone wall. "It's on a track," he explained, "Once you get it cracked, pushing it the rest of the way is easy."

Now where there was once a dead end, there was a dark hole in the wall. Green removed another torch and started down the stairs. I followed after and we stood a few steps down, waiting for Raven. The knight used a handle on our side of the wall to pull it back into place. It would have been completely dark if it hadn't been for the fire on the end of the torch.

"This will lead us out to one of the secret stations," Green explained, "The princess had a station built down here so she could take the train away from the castle without being noticed. Alfonzo and the... other me are good for that."

"So once we get down there, will the train be waiting?" I asked. It didn't seem possible. If they hadn't wanted word about the true intent behind the posters to spread, would they have told the engineer to pick us up?

"Oh, they know," Green replied, "They're trustworthy people in all this mess."

Sure as he said, the light at the end of the passage brought us out to a station. The train sat waiting at the platform. Apparently, Link had held onto the Spirit Train. Which was probably a good thing since I wouldn't have felt nearly as comfortable riding in that bucket of bolts he conducted at the beginning of Spirit Tracks.

The whistle blew loudly, causing me to jump a bit. It was so much louder in person than it was coming from the speakers on a DS.

"Hiho, everyone!" the blond shouted, grinning and waving at us from the controls. This Link was in his engineer's uniform. That was good. Otherwise, I may have had trouble telling him from Green since they were about the same age.

I waved back awkwardly. Uniform or no uniform, it was still really awkward to see yet another person with the same face as Green.

A tall fellow in a similar, brown uniform stuck his head out of the passenger car. "Just the three of you, right?" he asked, "From the way they all arrived at the same time, I assumed the lot would have made it here."

"Must've hit a split route in the transport," Raven replied, "It happens, Though the fact that they all scattered about makes things more difficult."

Alfonzo shrugged, standing aside and allowing us to board. "Well, there are a few others with the whole story out searching. There's the five. And we sent Ralph off earlier. That one wasn't too happy with the arrangement. Said he was the nobility of Labrynna and Hyrule's problems were no business of his," he spoke, "He can be an arrogant little such and such sometimes."

"Just the six of them?" Raven asked, "Is that really our entire search party?"

"I've got no way of knowing," Alfonzo shrugged, giving Link a signal to close the doors, "I departed the castle after Ralph was sent off. I assume princess Zelda has sent more since then but I have no way of knowing who they are."

"What about that Sagely fellow?" Raven asked, "Last I saw he was intent on rescuing our travelers as well."

"Who Ezlo?" Alfonzo asked, "He's at the tower looking for information on the links in the library. And likely grumbling to Anjean about the problems of being a hat."

"Didn't one of the Links lift that curse?" Raven asked, blinking rapidly in surprise. The train began pulling out of the station.

"Yes well, the fool tried to go up on that good for nothing again," Alfonzo sighed, "After Vaati broke his seal, I don't know what the old man was thinking. He's a smart fellow concerning the magical affairs and such but I sometimes wonder about his common sense."

"So in other words, we won't be hearing much of him other than nonsense, correct?" Raven asked.

"I'll say," Alfonzo grumbled, "Remember how he was the last time he was a hat? He's completely different. So dependent. So irritatingly... irritating."

"Don't I know it," Raven sighed, "What a headache that man was. I was almost glad to see the Picori door close for the year. Almost."

"We all were," Alfonzo sighed, "After that fiasco, the entire country needed a break from him." Alfonzo peered out the window. "Station's coming up," he stated, "You ready to go, missy?"

I nodded. "Kind of," I replied, "I'm wondering if we could pick up any information about the others from here. I mean, if one of them passed through, we could get a direction or something.

Alfonzo rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "It would be worth poking around," he replied, "But don't count your chickens. Hyrule's a big place, after all."

"I'm not," I replied. I was getting impatient. As much as I'd wanted to go to Hyrule before, now I was just ready to get this whole deal over with and go home. Normal would be wonderful after this. No magical links, no demons, just normal stuff. It's amazing how much a person can miss normal.

"Kakariko Village!" Link announced from up at the engine.

I stood and made my way to the door, the others trailing after me as we exited the train. Finally, a chance to seek out some information. I'd received a lot of explanation about the general situation but I was totally in the dark as to the other four's whereabouts. And that was a kind of information that I didn't like to be without.

Thinking on all the questions I had to ask the people within the village, I stepped through the gate.


	31. I Give Tetra a Lesson on Condensation

** So, after a month, I think it was, I'm back! My English class requires a lot of my time. It's an honors so we have a lot of projects, assigned books, and questions to do with said books. The latest one, Things Fall Apart, I didn't really like. But I was particularly partial to one of our summer books. Which leads me to Silver Neko Baka's book recommendation for the day, The Book Thief. Seriously people. Read it. READ IT!**

** Now, updates on everything else. Piezelle and I are plotting a sequel to Modern Hyrule since people seem to enjoy it. We've gotten a few major plot points decided upon and we're working together on developing a new character, whom I think you're all going to enjoy but I won't spoil anything for you. So, once this tale wraps itself up, keep an eye out for the next one. By the way... does anyone have any title suggestions?**

**Disclaimer:**** If I owned Zelda, this wouldn't be on a Fanfiction site. **

**Chapter 31: I Give Tetra a Lesson on Condensation**

As Link and I approached the ship, I had my first glimpse of Tetra. The first thing I noticed was the death glare. Of course, it was. In the short time I'd been traveling with her, I'd become quite acquainted with it and, to be honest, it wasn't exactly an easy thing to overlook. I could tell all the way from back here that crap was about to go down.

"Ship," she said simply, pointing to the deck, "Now."

I made a displeased face but, for once, didn't argue. Or at least, I didn't argue out loud. Mentally I was raging. Well, excuse me! She definitely could've come and gotten me earlier if it was oh so important! I didn't know why she was so crabby about me running off anyway. I'm the swabbie, not her pack horse! I couldn't help load that ship if my life depended on it, anyway! I'm not strong enough to lift half that crap! And here I was, thinking that I'd done a well enough job of annoying her that she'd be glad to get rid of me for an hour or so.

Link followed me onto the deck. The rest of the crew was already working in preparation to leave.

"Don't worry about her," he assured me, "She's just annoyed because she has to ruch back to the mainland."

I stared at him. "I still don't understand why she doesn't just wait it out."

"Because she's Tetra," he replied, "Don't try to reason through it. It'll only make you more confused."

"Maybe if she found her marbles, she'd stop zooming around so much," I mumbled.

Link opened his mouth to respond, but quickly stopped himself as the girl in question sauntered over. Tetra crossed her arms, a serious expression on her face.

"Swabbie, I want you to go down to the kitchen and bring me a bucket of steam," she ordered.

I glanced around dramatically for a few moments, awaiting her reaction. Captain, she may have been, but that didn't make it any less entertaining to get a rise out of her.

"What are you doing?" she demanded.

"Looking for Swabbie, captain," I replied innocently, "I'm Dakota."

Tetra gritted her teeth and pointed towards the doorway. "Go get it," she hissed.

"Nag, nag, nag," I huffed, turning and heading in the general direction, "Don't order me around, woman."

* * *

><p>The area was dark. It seemed that the good people of Hyrule didn't have the courtacy to invent the light bulb. Among other things.<p>

Of course, I was fully aware that it was impossible to collect a bucket of steam. Really, it was a terrible way to get me out of her hair. If I was dumb enough to actually fall for that one, I'd still be in the third grade. Of course, it wasn't a bad thing. After all, what's a professional smartass like me supposed to do without anything pathetic to mock?

I set the bucket down beside me with a slight "clang" and turned to the barrels of water in front of me. Excellent! I'd teach her to try and get rid of moi!

Quickly, I turned the tap on the front of the barrel. The water came gushing from the metal spout and into the bucket. As the metallic sound faded into a splash, I turned it off.

My arms tensed and my hands shook as I lifted it off the floor. I'd forgotten one very obvious fact. A metal bucket filled with water is about infinity plus one times heavier than an empty one.

"Mother of god," I hissed, doing a sideways walk out onto the deck again. The bucket was set on the wooden surface periodically to give my arms a break.

Tetra raised an eyebrow as she watched me approach, but made no attempt to comment or move away. That only made what I planned to do a lot easier. I got as close as I dared, setting the bucket on the deck and smirking at her. The look on her face was genuinely slightly worried. I had to admit, I loved that.

"FOR NARNIA!" I shouted, tipping the bucket and sending it's contents splashing over the deck, as well as Tetra's shoes. Just as planned! She'd had it coming to begin with!

Tetra stared down at her feet before slowly directing her gaze at me. I couldn't be a hundred percent sure, but I was fairly certain that her boots were full of water. "You little-!" she began.

"I'm sorry, m'am!" I interrupted, raising my hands defensively, "It condensed on the way up!"

Tetra took a step towards me, fists clenched and scowling. I didn't know whether she was going to tell me off or pop me one, but either way, it wasn't going to be pleasant. As such a conclusion was made, I saw no point in standing here and discovering exactly which it was.

"Never send a boss on dumb errands!" I shouted, taking off from where I stood and bolting to my room bellow deck.

As I arrived, I locked the door. Tetra probably had a key to it, but I assumed she'd be too busy with directing the crew and the storm coming to come chasing after me. That being said, I kicked my DC sneakers off and flopped back in my hammock. After all that work on that prank, I needed a nap.

* * *

><p>The ship pitched to the right and I awoke with my face planted on the floor. "Ow!" I complained loudly, sitting up and rubbing my nose. It didn't feel broken. But then again, I'd never broken my nose so how should I know what it feels like?<p>

I found myself sliding across the floor as the ship rocked violently and I grabbed the nearest stable, nailed down object and used it to pull myself up. I didn't even have to step out in order to know that Tetra hadn't been quite as successful in beating her storm to the mainland as she would have liked.

I staggered out of my room and onto the deck. I'd never been on a ship before and I was uncertain which out of above or below deck was the safest place to be in that situation. Never the less, I was going up. Even if above deck turned out to be the more idiotic of the two options, there was no way that I was staying alone in a dark room, on a rocking ship, in the middle of a storm.

As I took my first steps out, I had to squint to see anything that was going on for the sheets of rain falling and the spray from the waves ramming into the sides of the ship. One particularly violent collision caused me to stumble and grab the railing for extra support. I knew that one couldn't control the weather, but this was definitely NOT what I had signed up for!

Tetra, or at least, I assumed it was her through my squinting, motioned for me to get below deck again. So of course I ran right over to her. I have a reputation as a rebel to uphold!

"What are you doing, idiot?" she shouted over the sounds of the waves and wind, "Get back below deck before you blow over the side!"

"No way!" I shouted back, "You don't look like you have nearly enough people up here! Now tell me what I can do, or I'll start doing things on my own!"

"What happened to you, miss 'don't order me around'?" she demanded.

"What happened is it became a silly thought as soon as waves like Mount Everest started appearing! Now tell me what to do!" I retorted

"I'm telling you to get below deck!" she ordered.

"Sorry, I refuse that order! Try again!" I replied.

"I don't have time for you!" she growled, "I have a ship to manage and a crew to keep alive! Now get down before you get killed!"

The argument was interrupted by a shout from the crow's nest. The contents of which, couldn't be heard over the sounds of the storm around us.

"WHAT?" Tetra shouted back.

Another man, who was about halfway up the ropes, relayed the message to us. "He says he can see land!" he called, "Only a short distance away!"

"Tell Gonzo to keep steering us in that direction then!" she ordered.

"Captain, I'm afraid that was the good news!" he replied, "Now it's time for the bad news!"

"What bad news?" Tetra hissed, "This is an emergency! I don't want to hear any bad news spring up!"

"Captain, we couldn't see the coast until-!"

A loud 'BAM' was heard and the ship gave a sharp pitch. There was the deck, then there was nothing, and finally the icy shock of the salty water as I was enveloped by it. The man's message was now clearer than it would be if even he'd had a chance to finish. "We didn't see the coast until we were right up on the rocks."


	32. Stick Shift In The Saddle

** Report cards are next week. I'm scared. I hope you all enjoy this chapter. Because I'm trying to get this back on track and deal with my classes. Honors are a pain. I have an entire presentation to memorize for Spanish class. It's in Spanish. My brain's out of gas.**

**Disclaimer:**** Zelda isn't mine. I think we all know this by now so let's just move on.**

**Chapter 32: Stick Shift on the Saddle (Ginger's POV)**

Going back to sleep on a farm is easier said than done. I'm not sure how many of you live on a farm but, if you do, you have my sympathies. If not, allow me to give you a little description. Imagine yourself tired and about to crawl back into bed. Then imagine the incessant wailing of roosters outside your window. I don't know why those birds even exist. They're not the most graceful creatures in the world, nor do they have the best singing voices.

I made a growling sound in the back of my throat and rolled over, covering my ears with my pillow. However, it seems that what roosters lack in beauty, they more than make up for in volume. Exasperated, I tossed the pillow to the floor and sat up. It seemed that whether I wanted to or not, I was getting up. Likewise, whether I wanted to or not, I was getting those horseback riding lessons.

Grumbling to myself, I slid back out of bed, brushing my fingers through my hair quickly and marching myself back down stairs. Maybe I'd get lucky and I'd have some killer natural horse-riding skills. Then we could all go back inside where it was cool.

As I stepped out into the sun, the heat hit me like a ton of bricks. It would just figure I got dumped in such an itchy place during the summer. Places like this always seemed hotter than everywhere else for some reason. Maybe it was the hay. Hay is itchy and it makes everything else itchy.

Malon was waiting by the gate to the horse pasture. I knew she had spotted me when she began waving me over. I heaved a sigh in response and rolled my eyes. Let's just get this over with.

"Oh good, you're here," she nodded, "For a minute I thought I was going to have to come and get you. Again."

"Well then," I replied in a tired, droning tone, "Hallelujah. It's me. Aren't you happy?"

Matt- Link walked over, holding the reigns to a black horse in his hands. Link. God, I was never going to get used to calling him that. It's like when you have a teacher and she gets married. Then you have to get used to calling them by a whole other name and the entire time, you're going "miss- I mean-!" because you can't get used to the freaking change!

"Here's the horse you'll be practicing on," he said, "Don't worry. She's very calm."

I sighed, moving over to the side so I could climb onto the animal. Calm was good. However, it didn't change the fact that I didn't particularly care to learn. At all.

"Now, Link told me, "put your left foot in the stirrup and climb on."

Easy enough so far. Of course, I was just mounting the horse right now. When I actually started riding, I had a feeling that things were going to get a heap of a lot more difficult. I was not a rider by any means. Truth be told, I didn't even like horses. However, if they were all so determined to show me how to do this, I was going to have a hard time going up on all of them.

"Are you comfortable?" Link asked.

"My butt is on a hard piece of leather," I replied. I thought the answer would have been obvious from there.

Link chuckled slightly. "You'll get used to it." He took the reins and began leading me around slowly. I flailed a bit, feeling awkward and like I was about to tumble from the animal's back at any moment. You see, what they don't tell you about horseback riding is that when they start to walk, you're bounced around quite a bit.

"Ah! Hey, aren't I supposed to hold onto those?" I asked. It seemed pretty stupid that he'd be holding onto the reins when typically the person doing the riding should probably be in control of where they're going.

"I'm just giving you some time to adjust," he replied, "For now, you take the horn."

I was assuming that the horn was the piece sticking up in front of me. It seemed like a logical conclusion, anyway. Reaching out, I wrapped my hands around it. So, horses come with stick shift. Lovely. Now if only I could find the "park" setting, because I really didn't want to be up here.

"Doing alright?" Link asked. Apparently, the silence was either worrying, or a sign that nothing had exploded yet. I was going to go with the latter.

"Just peachy," I answered in a slightly huffy tone.

"Good," he nodded.

"How long before we're ready to leave?" I asked. The answer better have been 'today'. I had to get off of this hot, sticky, nuthouse experiment of a ranch, and I had to do it today.

"Well, we've got to get you acclimated with being up there. Then you have to learn to walk on your own. It wouldn't help for you to learn to move at a faster pace either. I guarantee you that it'll be hard to find the others without getting into at least one spot," he listed.

"All for the short, short time of...?" I prompted.

"A week or two at least," he replied, "Depending on how fast you learn, that is."

I leaned back in the saddle and groaned loudly. Two weeks? No way in hell was I saying here for two weeks!

"Anyway to gain a lesser frame of time, Peter Pan?" I grumbled.

"Work hard and learn fast," he replied.

I could have sworn at that point that I heard a mocking little "hehehe" from Link's shadow, which caused me to shoot my death glare in it's general direction. I'd almost forgotten about his little imp friend. Unfortunately, she apparently hadn't forgotten about me.

"Is that the only way?" I asked.

"It is if you want to be able to travel the country at a reasonable pace," he sighed.

"Well then," I pouted, "Fine. I'll be the best horseback rider you've ever seen in your life!"

A small smile graced the older Link's features. "I'm sure you will."

"Second to me, of course," Blue puffed.

Oh right. I'd been so busy thinking about the horse and complaining that I'd forgotten about him too. If only it could've stayed that way.

"You wanna fight, punk?" I growled at him, "I'll be better than you! Is that a challenge? Because if it is, I'll take ya!"

An annoyed expression graced the younger of the two Links' features. "You bet it was!" he snapped, "I'll give you one week before you give up!"

"Stop," I ordered Link, who complied and halted the animal, giving me time to swing down from the saddle, "Hammer time," I mumbled to myself, unable to resist the urge to complete the phrase despite how annoyed I was becoming.

My feet hit the ground with a 'thump' and I marched myself over to Blue as quickly as I could, seizing him by the collar of his blue tunic. "Oh, it's ON!" I hissed, "It's ON!"

Blue snatched himself away from my grip and gave me a harsh glare. "Fine! If it's on, then go back and get on the frickin' horse!"

"Oh, you don't think I will, do you?" I challenged, "You don't think I will, but I will! I'll go get on the horse! I am the frickin' horse QUEEN, buddy!"

Blue opened his mouth to reply, but was quickly stopped by Link tugging the back of his tunic. I felt a similar tug on the back of my T-shirt and it was just then that I realized how dangerously close to striking range we were. Or at least, that was what my money was on. Link and Malon had assumed that one of us was going to sock the other and had pulled us back before things could get ugly.

"I think that's enough excitement for the moment," Malon said, sounding a bit nervous. Probably because she knew that I could yank myself out of her grasp if I really wanted to. "Let's go inside for a bit. Link, you can pick this up with Ginger later."

"I think that's a good idea," Link said, gripping Blue's hand tightly like a parent leading around a particularly rambunctious child, "Come on, mini-me. Let's go back inside now."

As Link lead Blue to the house, I could hear him shouting at the older boy from where I stood. "CALL ME MINI-ME ONE MORE TIME-!"

The rest of the comment was cut off by the slamming of the farmhouse door. A pity too, because I really would have liked to have heard the rest of that threat. I'm always looking for new threat ideas. They're so hard to come up with.

"Come on inside, Ginger," Malon said, letting go of my shirt, "You two should come out here closer to dark, when it's not as hot. I'll make sure Blue stays in the house."

"Don't," I replied.

"But I thought you didn't like each other," she said, obviously confused.

"We don't," I confirmed, taking a few steps back to the house, "But if he's inside, who am I going to dance around while I sing 'I win, I win, I win'?"

The door to the house closed behind me and I headed back upstairs. Finally, an excuse to sleep the day away.


	33. Christmas Carols and People Eaters

** Wow... it's taken a bit to get my muse back up. Sorry, guys.` Honk if Silver Neko Baka needs to get off her lazy butt and write.**

** Disclaimer: I don't own Zelda. If I did, I wouldn't be posting stories about it on a Fanfiction site. I also don't own "dashing through the snow on a pair of broken skis" and "The Song That Doesn't End".**

**Chapter 33: Christmas Carols and People Eaters (Kevin's POV)**

It had been a while since the incident at the lake, and Ralph still refused to say a word to me. Not that I could blame him. Honestly, if I were him, I wouldn't know what to say to me either. Moving that aside for now, it was an annoying development. It was kind of hard to figure out where we were going when he wouldn't tell me anything. His blinkers seemed to be out as well, because probably almost rolled right into him a dozen times as he turned unexpectedly.

Winding trails through forests were far from my favorite things in the world. Not for the reason you might have thought, though. The real reason I hated them was because my heelies hated them. It's almost impossible to make a sharp turn on heelies without grabbing onto something or stopping and repositioning yourself to roll in that direction. Riddle me this, how am I supposed to roll epically like Jell-O in a tree if I can't roll down a path?

Ralph didn't seem at all concerned with my situation, even though the inability to be Jell-O was an absolute crisis. He simply continued onwards in his own silent, annoyed, blinker-deprived fashion.

I continued on behind him, hoping that we arrived wherever we were going quickly. I was getting bored and I'd lost my jellybeans to the evil demon lake behind us. My companion was so quiet that I'd given up all hope of deriving any enjoyment out of annoying him a while ago. However, that didn't stop me from talking. Trust me, I like to talk, and most people like to listen.

"The sky's turning purple," I pointed out, looking up at what little sky I could see between the branches and leaves overhead.

"Mh," Ralph grunted, which was all he'd been saying for at least a half an hour.

"It looks like blueberry cream cheese," I pressed on.

Another grunt. "Hn."

"On salmon," I continued, looking at the pink-ish clouds.

No answer came this time. It looked like we'd finally entered the silent treatment zone. I was pretty used to that by now. Even so, I wondered if there was anything I could say to snap him out of it.

I continued looking, noticing a cloud that was still mostly white and had a large, purple stripe directly down the center. Quickly, I tried to come up with the most disgusting picture that I possibly could. "Look! A cat crap sandwich!"

I glanced at the noble to see if my analysis of the cloud had worked. Sure enough, he looked a bit more green than fair-skinned. Which taking his red hair into consideration, made him very Christmas color-y.

"What is _wrong_ with you?" he demanded.

"Nothing is wrong with me! I'm amazing!" I replied, observing his green face. I had a great desire to sing a Christmas song now. Most people probably would have hesitated out of concern for the guy, or the fear of looking ridiculous. Me? I just went right to it.

_ "Dashing through the snow, on a pair of broken skis. Running into trash cans and running into trees."_

Ralph quirked an eyebrow and gave me a definite 'you've gone nuts look'. Really? Like that's ever stopped me from singing before!

_"The snow is turning red. I think I'm almost dead. I'm sitting in the hospital with stitches in my head. Oh! Jingle bells! Batman smells! Robin laid an egg! Batmobile lost a wheel, and Joker got away!"_

The noble looked like he was about ready to find a pay phone and call the men in white to pick me up. That being said, it was probably a good thing that this country hadn't advanced to the land of telephone technology yet.

"Good gods, you're morbid," he grumbled.

"What?" I asked, "You don't like 'Dashing Through the Snow'? It's a classic!"

"Your classics are morbid," he replied simply.

"Juke box time! Time to change up the mix!" I cheered, _"This is the song that doesn't end! Yes it goes on and on, my friend! Some people started singing it, not knowing what it was! Now they'll keep on just singing it forever just because- This is the song that doesn't end! Yes it goes on and on my friend! Some people-!"_

"Enough!" Ralph barked, looking even more irritated than when we'd fallen into the lake, if that was at all possible.

"Well, hey!" I argued back, "You didn't like the 'Dashing Through the Snow' thing! I'm just giving you options!"

"How about this option?" he snapped, "Say nothing! Be quiet!"

So I did. For about five seconds, that was. "...You know, I bet there could be a flying purple people eater up in that sky right now, and we'd never notice it because it's all purple up there."

Ralph groaned. "Goddess kill me now."

"That's the beauty of the flying purple people eater," I continued, "You'd never see it in weather like this. The majestic camouflaging capabilities of the rare one-eyed one-horned flying purple people eater."

"What are you babbling about now?" Ralph demanded, rolling his eyes.

"I'm trying to sound like one of those dudes on the discovery channel," I admitted, "Or the aliens guy." I paused and spread my hands like the fellow in the aliens meme. "Aliens," I announced dramatically.

"I give up," Ralph sighed.

"I have that effect on many people," I assured him.

"Just shut up. You're giving me a headache," he groaned.

"Side effects of Kevin, may include headache from over exposure to epicness," I stated.

Ralph didn't reply. He simply walked on, grumbling to himself. "I'm nobility. How dare they send me out on these errands like a servant."

"Maybe you're not nobility," I replied, "Maybe you really are a servant. Oh my god! Your whole life has been a lie! I'm so sorry!"

Ralph stopped abruptly and turned to face me. "Shut up!" he hissed.

"I don't take orders from mislead servants," I told him.

Ralph looked like he might pop a vein. To give him some credit, he did an excellent job of not punching me, which I was sure was quite a task.

"No, you dolt!" he grumbled, "We're here!"

* * *

><p>The clearing was large, which was a relief since places enclosed with trees can make one a bit claustrophobic. Within the area, there were animals. And I don't mean animals frolicking about and grazing in their "natural habitat", as our science teacher back home would have put it. The animals sat still and motionless. Under normal circumstances, that would have probably been creepy. However, they were peaceful. They could get up and leave at any time they pleased, but they chose to remain where they were.<p>

There were rabbits, deer, foxes, squirrels, basically anything and everything that would have made the girls in our group go "awww". In fact, they made me want to "aw" as well. A few of them swayed their heads in time to the music which was being played.

The final chord of the song was struck and the musician looked up from her harp. "Ralph," the blue-haired woman said, "Glad to see you back safely."

Ralph's face changed color again, this time more red than green. Too bad about that. I didn't have an excuse to sing song parodies to him anymore. For once, the sour look disappeared from his features to be replaced by the dorkiest grin I'd ever seen.

"Well, of course I am!" he exclaimed proudly, puffing his chest out a bit, "Why would I run off and abandon my precious Nayru? No matter the danger, I shall return! I'm amazing like that!"

The woman, Nayru, covered her mouth to stifle a laugh. "You're something else," she replied, "I'll give you that."

"Why of course I am!" Ralph replied, still grinning.

"I see you've delivered the mage boy to use safely as well," she replied, "I must admit, I had my worries. The birds from the Castle Town market just returned to me. They inform me that the guard is going wild looking for them, bless their hearts."

Normally when someone in North Carolina says "bless your heart", it means "yeah, that's nice, kid". I wasn't sure if it was the custom here, or just Nayru. But when she said "bless your heart" it was pretty apparent that it was sincere.

"Enough of the negativity," she continued, "Come, let me take a look at you."

I took a step forward, only to be paused by Ralph. "Don't try anything with my Nayru," he said, "I'm warning you."

Oh, please. Sure she was pretty, but she was DEFINATELY too old for me. Ralph was one strange, paranoid noble.

Shaking his hand off, I approached her. Nayru took my hand. "Hold still," she ordered, placing a hand against my forehead. Memories of the Modern Hyrule theme park and our trip up until this point flashed through my mind. Our first entrance through the gate, our abrupt departure, the five Links appearing at our middle school, my time spent with Red. Everything from the past few days was there.

After a moment, she took her hand away, glancing at Ralph and chewing her lip nervously. "The situation isn't good at all," she informed him, "The demon's forces should be attempting to locate them as well, and the memories hold no information about what branch of the portal the others traveled down."

I would have asked what she'd done, but the answer was obvious. She'd taken a peek into my memories of the trip. "But it was so white and empty in there. Even if I had an idea of what path they went down, could you tell where they landed just from looking at that?"

"How dare you question her!" Ralph exclaimed in outrage, "Of course my Nayru could tell you something as simple as that! Isn't that right?"

Nayru sighed to herself. "I'm afraid not, Ralph," she responded, "It's difficult, if not impossible to tell where one is going from looking at the inside of a portal. Experienced travelers can control their direction, but they still have no earthy idea of where it will send them."

Ralph looked so much like a balloon that someone had let the air out of, I wanted to laugh. It was clear that he thought highly of Nayru, which was funny in itself, because it was hard to imagine a high-and-mighty man like him thinking highly of anyone other than himself.

"When Princess Zelda sent out the message about your arrival, she only did so for those who she trusted without question," Nayru stated, "Because Ralph and I are among those who received it, we know the rendezvous point for you and the others."

"Rendezvous point?" I inquired. Normally, I would have cracked a sneeze joke after the word "rendezvous". However, at the moment, the promise of meeting up with the gang outweighed my infamous since of humor at the moment.

"Yes," she replied, "The point was set after our older Link and the five others were sent to your world. We had to allow for the possibility that you'd fail to close the portal from your side. Don't worry. It's a very safe place. It's protected very well from outside attacks."

"Why didn't Ralph just drop me off there instead of bringing me here to you?" I asked. That would have made a whole lot more sense to me.

"I wanted to have a peek at you," she replied, "Memories of the portals can't give us an exact location, but they can give us a general direction. Unfortunately, your memories don't hold anything about the others within the portal."

"Which brings us to our next question," I said, "I'll take 'how can you see into my head' for five hundred, Alex."

"Isn't it obvious?" Ralph interrupted, "As the oracle of ages, why on the goddess' earth shouldn't she be able to see memories from the past?"

"Oracle of... what?" I asked.

Mister Snippy McSnippypants face palmed. "Are all outsiders this dense?" he grumbled.

"Forget I asked," I sighed.

Nayru was about to respond when deer leaped from the bushes in a frenzy. It landed in front of us and pawed the ground in an agitated manner and shaking it's head. The animal turned to Nayru, seeming to become more and more skittish as it stood there.

The oracle tensed a bit before nodding and shooing it off. "It looks like they're onto you sooner than I expected," she informed me, "Hurry off that way. That path should take you to your destination. Ralph, you accompany him."

"What?" Ralph demanded," No, no! I'm not leaving!"

"Ralph!" Nayru prompted, "He's the one who needs to be guarded. They won't bother me."

The red-head cursed under his breath, grabbing the sleeve of my shirt tightly and pulling me behind him. "Come on now," he ordered, "Quickly!"

Ralph glanced back at Nayru for assurance. The oracle nodded to him. "Go on," she told him, "I have time to conceal myself before it gets here."

The man nodded, turning back to the path and rushing off with me half running and half being dragged behind him. "Keep up," he snapped, "I swear to the goddess, you'd better be worth all the hoo-ha I'm being put through."

**AN: And now for my lovely readers, have a few questions.**

**I'm trying to get on a regular update schedule. What would you consider a good frame of time for updates? Weekly? Bi-weekly? I do have school too, you know.**

**Which character's magic would you like to see developed more first in later chapters?**

**Which character would you consider the most likely to completely adapt to life in Hyrule? I'm curious.**


	34. More Magical Confusion

** You know, I'll never understand why they insist on assigning us such depressing books for English. Really. Have you ever read Night by Elie Wiezel? Unless you're fascinated by the holocaust, don't. I mean it, people. It's depressing as heck. I cannot believe that I had to pause my reading of Lovecraft's short stories just to be emotionally driven into the ground. I like books with feelings. Just not so many sad ones.**

**Disclaimer:**** Zelda isn't mine. **

**Chapter 34: More Magical Confusion (Ruby's POV)**

The room was unfocused when I opened my eyes. The very fact that I was in a position to open my eyes at all came as a shock to me. What was even more shocking was my location. Though I couldn't make out the exact details due to the absence of my glasses, I could see well enough to confirm that I wasn't a splatter on the ground outside Vaati's tower.

I sat up slowly, fumbling about for my glasses on the table beside me. Once they were back in place, it came as a great relief to my poor eyes, the strain on which was starting to give me a headache. With my vision cleared, I did what anyone would do in that situation. I took a moment to look at my surroundings.

The room was small, but comfortable. It was rather plain in terms of furnishings, not that I needed anything else since I'd been out like a light. Other than the bed and the table, there wasn't much else to stare at. Sighing to myself, I laid back down. One minute I'm falling out a window and hurdling towards the ground from god only knows how high, and the next I'm in a decent bed in a decent room with no idea of where said room is located. Fudge, I was confused! If there's one thing I hate, it's being confused. I don't cope well with confusion. I freak out and lose my ability to function properly. Which was what I was doing now.

Whenever I'm confused, it's always the same story. I stay still in one place and do nothing except try to think. The only problem with that is that I can't actually think properly so I end up in a muddled mess wherever I am with a million things going on in my head. Some are perfectly valid things to ponder at that moment, some are irrational things having to do with what's going on, but I can't help but obsess over them anyway, and then it all leads up to everything else going on around me that I'm actually aware of until what I'm worrying about multiplies several times over.

I was in a room. Why was I in a room? Where was this room that I was in? I hadn't hit the ground outside the tower. I was alive, but alive didn't necessarily mean safe. Was I safe? If I wasn't safe than why bother with me in the first place? I highly doubted the other villains of the Zelda universe were courteous enough get a room at an inn for an unconscious mage to sleep in. So I must have been safe, right? Even if I wasn't, were the others safe? Where were they? What were they doing? What if I'd accidentally gotten them killed? I'd said "okay" back on our Earth when we were threatened at the skate track. Why had I said "okay"? Had my "okay" gotten them killed? Why was I so stupid? Why didn't I try to stand up for us a little bit? Was anyone looking for us? The Links?

You see, that's how insane I get when I'm worried. A million questions with no definite answer for the time being were floating around in my head, some of which were completely ridiculous things to obsess over.

I just needed to stop thinking. Just stop for a while. If I could just curl up and go back to sleep, maybe I'd wake up calmer. I slipped my glasses off again and rolled over onto my right side. I normally hate facing away from doorways, it makes me jittery. However, my right side was my comfortable side, and as far as I was concerned, if I was going to do sleep, I might as well do it right.

It wasn't at all uncomfortable here. It was nice. It was warm. If there was one thing that helped me sleep, it was being somewhere warm. I curled the blankets tightly around me to make sure it stayed that way.

I had almost dropped off when the sound of the door handle turning roused me from my rest. The surprise the sudden sound gave me caused me to jump and I flipped the covers off of myself. On the chance that someone unpleasant was entering, I didn't want to be stuck in a cocoon when they entered. I prefer my full mobility, thank you very much.

The entire room seemed to relax and breathe easier as the door opened. The purple clothing and the familiar face thankfully belonged to someone whom I could say with absolute certainty had no intention of doing any harm.

"I see you're awake," Vio said calmly.

"Maybe I just like to sleep sitting up with my eyes open," I replied. I didn't mean to be snippy, but I was still mixed up. Sarcasm lightened my mood, whether I was actually in the mood to crack a joke or not.

"Maybe," he replied, "But I doubt it." Vio wasn't the most humorous of the five Links, or four Links now, but he could read the atmosphere enough to know when someone was trying to assure themselves and offered me the satisfaction of a slight smile. "At least it seems you're feeling better now."

"Well, that's one way to put it," I replied, "Define 'better', because I'm confused and my brain is basically just a big ball of weird right now."

Vio sighed and approached me, sitting himself on the edge of the bed. Oh good, an explanation was coming. That was exactly what I needed. Hopefully this one would be easier to digest than the one back at the skate track.

"Catching you after you slipped out that window wasn't easy," he said, "Especially because we were on our way inside for our little rescue operation. In fact, the only reason we caught up to you was because one of the older Links has a pair of wings with him."

I thought for a moment. Only two Links that I knew of could fit that description. Minish Cap Link had the Roc's Cape, but he was younger than Vio. The only other possibility could be Skyward Sword Link.

"The one from SS- I mean, Skyloft," I concluded.

Vio nodded. "We figured that given your location, his ability to handle a Loftwing would be useful. Speaking of my older version, I have a bit more news for you."

"Good news, I hope?" I asked.

"Good enough," he replied, "We've found the new location of the rift. It's in his country."

"Up in Skyloft?" I tilted my head a bit. It wasn't completely insane for the rift to move such a distance away, or at least no more insane than anything else I'd heard in the past twenty four hours.

"Correct," Vio nodded, "Which is convenient given where our rendezvous point is with the others."

"And that point would be... where exactly?" I pressed.

"The safest place in the area," he answered, "The tower of spirits. However, the issue is that since it's the most shielded place in the country, our pursuers are expecting us to go there."

"Well then, why don't we just stay away from it if it's what they expect?" I continued to question him, "Wouldn't it be safer to make their search harder?"

"A valid point," Vio nodded, "While they are expecting us to eventually arrive there, and the barriers won't have effect on the Hylian guard, it's also the location of the nearest remaining bird statue."

"No effect on the guard?" That piece of information didn't exactly assure me of this plan's chances of working.

"The guard isn't moving with knowledge that they're doing anything other than their jobs. The obvious lack of ill intent doesn't make them a threat to the area. Therefore the charms won't effect them," he explained.

My head was already spinning again. I wasn't so sure I liked this magic stuff much. It was way too confusing. Between my previous confusion and the more recent confusion, the best I could manage was something along the lines of "Uh... huh..."

"It'll make sense when we get there," the boy in purple said, grabbing my arm and pulling me to my feet, which hit the floor and immediately sent me jumping back onto the bed.

"Shoes first," I replied, grabbing my boots from beside the bed and tugging them onto my feet, "I don't like unpolished wood floors. Too many splinters."

Vio gave me an odd look, but said nothing as I put my shoes on. I stood back up, this time on my own, and started to make my way towards the door.

"Well, come on now," I said, "We were in a hurry, right?"

* * *

><p>Allow me to let you in on a very useful little fact. After you wake up in an inn located in a strange country, are informed that your way back home has migrated above the clouds, and all this has taken place after you almost die, you <em>really<em> aren't in the mood to face the world's biggest asshole.

As soon as my feet hit the bottom of the stairs, my mouth dropped open and I immediately found myself with my arm extended and my index finger pointing itself in his general direction. "You!" I exclaimed, thought I'm not quite sure if I was afraid, surprised, or just steaming angry as the world left my mouth. It was likely a combination of the three.

"Me," Shadow replied, offering me a cocky grin, which I would have liked nothing more than to slap off his face.

I turned to Vio. The look on my face must have been pretty hostile because his expression when I stared back at him was something along the lines of a cross between having just swallowed an insect and being chased by a very angry dog.

I elected to ignore that and focus on the matter at hand. "What is _he _doing here?" I demanded.

"W-well, you see," Vio began, "He'll be... tagging along."

"Pfft," Shadow blew his hair out of his face, "You say it like I _want_ to be here!"

It made sense that Shadow wouldn't be going along voluntarily. Especially not after what happened at the Palace of Winds. On the other hand though, I couldn't see him as the kind of person who would be easily forced into going somewhere he didn't want to go.

"Listen up, kids," he grumbled, "Here's the story. I was up in my room, minding my own business, when this annoying twit shows up at my window! On a Loftwing, of all things! Next thing I know, I'm under a binding spell and flying out towards Kakriko! Oh joy!"

Shadow made a huffing noise and rolled his eyes. I on the other hand, continued to glare daggers. "Was it absolutely necessary for you to bring him?"

"Look, I don't like you any more than you do," Vio said, "But working for Vaati means that he had the best knowledge of how the portals work. It's not something that we could leave behind so easily. The rest of us all know of their existence, but we were all relying on him to help you learn how to close it."

"Oh, so he's my teacher now too?" I groaned, "Beautiful. Absolutely beautiful."

"Look, if we're going then go already!" Shadow interrupted rudely, "You all might have time to roll in fields of flowers, or whatever the crap you goody-goodies do, but I for one would like to finish my job and get this bind off of me as soon as possible."

"And who said we'd release you after you were done?" Vio raised an eyebrow, "You'll be lucky if that binding's your only punishment for jeopardizing this mission."

"Blah, blah, blah," Shadow grumbled. He was obviously very concerned about what other forms of punishment he might receive.

"Oh, just come on," I rolled my eyes, "The sooner it stops grumbling, the better."

Shadow glared at me and scowled. "It?" he demanded.

I simply reached over and grabbed him by the sleeve of his tunic, dragging him out the door as Vio trailed behind us. "You don't deserve gender specification," I muttered.

* * *

><p>Kakariko village was much more impressive when viewed from it's streets. I was quickly finding out that the images on a TV screen never matched up to the real thing. The village was much larger than it seemed from our television in the living room. I think what gave it the most impact, however, was that everything here could be fully appreciated by the senses. The creaking of the wooden window shutters on the older buildings, the slamming of doors as the events moved in real time as opposed to the routine programming of the game, the smell of the dusty desert air, nothing was left to be imagined because it was all right here. This was the first time that I'd actually had the opportunity to feel awed at what was happening around me. Up until now, I'd never gotten anything out of this experience except panic and confusion. It was almost enough to make me forget the temperamental teenaged brat standing beside me.<p>

"I think the first thing's first," Vio said, "We should find a change of clothes. Your face still matches the posters, but you won't draw nearly as much attention if you're dressed like a native."

"True," I agreed, "But I don't have anything to pay for it with."

"Leave that worry to me," Vio replied, "Just go find something. It's not like there aren't enough shops here. There's bound to be something you like."

With a nod of my head, I turned and began heading down the street and looking at the shops scattered about and the fellows with their small stands on the street. It wasn't the market in Castle Town, but it still wasn't a bad assortment of goods.

I paused at one table and examined a plain, black tunic. If I was going to travel Hyrule, I wasn't going to do it in anything fancy. Fancy clothing always draws attention to the person wearing it, which would completely defeat the purpose of getting anything to wear in the first place. I wasn't going to dress like a girl either. If I had to defend myself at all during this trip, I wasn't going to do it while wearing a dress. Maybe there was some reasoning about a dress being impractical for battle, but to be honest, it was mainly due to the immature desire to look cool.

I set the article of clothing down and turned to make my way to the next table when a loud exclamation came from behind me. "RUBY!"

Quickly, I turned in the direction. I was still scattered and wasn't quite in the right frame of mind to recognize the voice on the spot, but I knew if anyone was shouting my name, it was a good sign. No one in Hyrule knew me by name except the five Links and the older Link from Twilight Princess, and the voice was female. If someone was calling me, it had to be one of the others.

I paused, staring at the person before me and trying to process my relief and excitement. Unfortunately, my excitement refused to be contained and continued interfering with my ability to think my actions through until I found myself shouting loudly and flinging my arms around the other girl.

The goddesses smiled on me that day. They should have. They owed me one.

**Thanks for not killing me because I didn't update exactly when I said I would. I'm going to try to type up the next chapter later this week and submit it. I think I owe you one for not sticking to my "two week update" policy. I'm very sorry about that.**

**Now, you know what time it is!**

**Out of curiosity, what Zelda characters would you like to see in the story that haven't appeared yet? Shout 'em out! I'm looking to include more canons in MH and it's easier if I know who you'd all like to see. **

**I've already planned out what kind of magic my mages use, but since I'm wondering what you're thinking, what kind of magic do you think they have?**

**And last but not least, how was your day today?**


	35. An Unexpected Encounter

** I'm really sorry for not updating. My muse just went poof on me. I'm still not sure it's a hundred percent with me, but I'm going to do my best to see this story through to the end, because I've already come so far with it, and I really don't want to be the person who abandons their story and lets people wonder forever about how it would have ended. I'm going to delete that little hiatus note on my profile and hop back to work. My muse is still mainly with my original story, which is why I was having trouble writing this. I've developed the rifts and magic so much while working on my original work that it's difficult for me to come back here, where it's so undeveloped. Never the less, I fully intend to make up for keeping you hanging.**

**Disclaimer:**** Do I look like I own Zelda? How about "no"?**

**Chapter 35: An Unexpected Encouter (Lya's POV)**

The train pulled into the station at Kakariko Village smoothly. I had to admit, it was a relief that Spirit Tracks Link knew how to drive. Of course, he obviously knew how to drive in game. However, how well he did so depended on the person playing. What I was thankful for was the fact that he could drive a heck of a lot better than some of the gamers that controlled him.

The merging of the time line was a useful thing as well. It was much faster to travel by train than by horse, and from what I'd seen on the way here, we had access to all the locations pre-Spirit Tracks a well. The ability to take this other Link's train to places such as Kakariko and Ordon was a convenience that I fully intended to abuse if our trip here was a prolonged affair.

Alfonzo stood first and opened the door to the passenger's car. He said nothing, but the way he stood by the door made the message obvious, _'Are we going or what?'._ Raven, Green, and I rose from our seats and stepped out to the station. The station was simple, but I guess it did what it was intended to do. It was little more than a wooden platform with stairs leading up to it. I had to say, it wasn't very impressive, but then again, none of the station platforms were very impressive from what I'd seen of the game.

Raven brushed a hand through his sandy colored hair and gestured to the town in front of us. "Right then," he said, "And here we have the lovely Kakariko Village. I suggest we get moving. Dawdling too long will attract attention.

He didn't need to tell me to get moving. The impressive sight of the village's existence in a real life setting was enough to spur me onward towards the market. The buildings were nothing fancy, but the very fact that it was what it was made it impressive to behold. Of course, I wasn't as big a nerd about the series as Ruby, but I still enjoyed it enough that I could be impressed by my location.

"I see our mage is already off and wandering," Raven spoke at my side, "Walk as you will, and remember to find yourself some more native-looking clothing. Just don't attract too much attention. You never know who's about."

I turned and looked at him for a moment. "I don't have any money," I reminded him, "How can I get anything without any rupees? Unless the vendors here are really, really generous."

Raven put his hand in his pocket and dug out a few blue rupees. He had obviously been anticipating that complaint, because he didn't so much as bat an eye when he handed his money over. "That should pay for what you need," he said, "You shouldn't get anything too fancy anyway. Fancy clothing draws attention."

I gave him a short nod and turned back towards the market. I wasn't looking at getting anything too fancy anyway. I'm not a person who likes fancy clothing. I wear simple things, jeans, t-shirts, nice things like that. If I was looking to draw attention to myself, I would have normally dressed in flashier clothing, but I wasn't Ruby. I don't understand why she dresses the way she does either. The kid wasn't exactly the most outgoing person in the world, in fact, the only ways I'd seen to get her talking were to bring up a mutual interest or make her mad. Yet she always dressed like some kind of fancy manga girl. Oxymoron much?

Walking over to the first booth I saw that was selling clothing, I picked up a dark green tunic and a pair of brown pants that was sitting beside it. It was definitely something that I'd consider. After all, it wasn't very much different than the clothing I'd arrived in, a green t-shirt and a pair of brown pants. What is a tunic if not a long shirt? That's what they looked like to me when they didn't have a belt with them, anyway.

I folded my selection over my arm and handed the man on the other side of the table my money. That had been easy enough. I know that it takes most people all day to go clothes shopping, but you have to consider the fact that when most people go clothes shopping, they either enjoy it or have their mothers with them.

As I turned away from the vendor, my attention was immediately drawn to a figure that stuck out like a sore thumb in the crowd. Flashy clothing could draw the attention of enemies, but it was working in my favor at the moment because Ruby was absolutely unmistakeable in that get-up. "Hey!" I shouted, walking quickly after her, "RUBY!"

Ruby paused, turning uncertainly as if she was uncertain that she was the one being addressed. The younger girl's eyes widened a fraction when she saw me approaching her. "Lya?" she asked, gaping like a fish for a moment before a large, ridiculous grin spread over her face, "LYA!"

I backed up a bit in an attempt to evade her grasp as she threw herself at me. Unfortunately, it was a futile attempt, because in the next instant, I found myself sprawled on the ground with the girl clinging to me like some kind of giant spider monkey. "Lya!" she exclaimed, hugging me tightly, "I missed you! I've had so much crap to deal with since I've been here! I thought I'd never see you again!"

"Ruby," I said, attempting to push the other girl away from me. It wasn't much use, she could really cling if she wanted to.

"Yes?" she asked.

"I'm happy to see you too, but get off!" I told her, "I need my space!"

Ruby's smile faded a bit as she slid off of me. "Oh..." she replied, sounding a bit disappointed that I didn't share her need to cling to someone and pet them.

"Good girl," I said, rising to my feet and brushing myself off. Ruby did the same, before looking back at me again with her goofy grin once again in place.

"Are you by yourself?" she asked, "Or have you met any of the others?" She looked so much like an excited puppy right then that I felt a bit bad that I had to disappoint her. Never the less, I wasn't going to lie to her.

"You're the first one," I replied, "Sorry. I was about to ask you the same thing."

Her smile faltered once again and she drooped slightly. "Ah, okay," she said, "At least you and I are together now. We'll find the others."

"Hopefully they ran into some friendly faces like we did," I said, "If not, then they could be in for it."

Ruby placed a hand on her hip and frowned at me. "Don't be so pessimistic. They'll be fine," she snipped. There was an edge to her voice, and I couldn't help but wonder if she was actually scolding me, or if she was assuring herself, "At least you met someone right off the bat. I didn't see Vio until I'd already flung myself out a tower window!"

"Wait... you did what now?" I asked, raising an eyebrow. Somehow, I couldn't see her being that much of a maniac, "And my life hasn't exactly been easy either! I was arrested in castle town!"

"Well, it wasn't on purpose!" she protested, "Well, there were friendly type people nearby for you."

I sighed to myself. "True," I said. Even when I had been arrested, Green had been nearby, and Raven. Even though I hadn't been aware that Raven was on our side at the time, he still counted.

"How convenient!" Raven said happily. I turned to see the man strolling towards us with a smile on his face, "I didn't think we'd run into another mage out here. This is convenient indeed. Do you have guides? We can give you a lift on the Spirit Train, and some extra protection for the journey would be welcome."

Ruby nodded after Raven finished speaking. "They're just over there," she pointed to Vio and Shadow, who were hanging out a short distance away, "Well, Vio's the guide anyway. I wouldn't trust the boy in black as far as I could throw him."

Shadow scowled and glared at her from where he stood. He opened his mouth as if he were about to retort, but was cut off by my companion. "The ass who tried to kill me doesn't deserve to speak in his own defense," she glared back.

Shadow let out a snort and rolled his eyes. "Didn't have anything to say to you anyway," he grumbled under his breath, turning away.

"Have you gotten what you came for?" I asked, "If you're all done, I think we should probably get moving." A safe place sounded nice to me right about now. I was ready to get to the tower as soon as possible. If the others were being led there as well and hadn't been captured, we'd all be back together soon.

"To the tower, right?" Ruby asked, "Then when they're back with us, we can head home."

"Ruby, you're forgetting something," I said, "We don't know where the rift that will lead us back home is."

"No, we do," she insisted, "Vio's been talking to the Skyward Sword Link. He says that it's in Skyloft."

"Skyloft?" I asked, "As in above the freaking clouds? Yes, that's helpful considering that we aren't Loftwing riders." Even if we could access a bird statue, we'd crash back to earth. There'd be no bird waiting to catch us once we were above the clouds.

"Skyloft..." Raven mumbled thoughtfully, "One of the last bird statues is by the tower. I'm assuming that the people above the clouds are already aware of the predicament if the rift has made its way into their country." He placed a hand on his chin and stood there in silence for a moment. "Vio!" he finally spoke, "Have you and your Skyloftian friend made preparations for our arrival?"

"They've been made," the purple Link replied, "We began planning the instant he arrived to tell me that a rift had opened in their country."

"That takes care of a lot of the hassle," Raven nodded, "Come now, let's get back to the train. We shouldn't dawdle too long here. Word about you will reach the village eventually."

Raven turned and began making his way towards the station. The train was still waiting for us, and it looked like we were clear to go for the moment.

I turned back to Ruby. "He's right. We should head off. I don't want to be here when we wear out our welcome."

**(Break)**

The tower, like everything else, was much more large and impressive in person. It looked so small on the screen of a DS. Of course, you could park an entire train inside it, so that should indicate that there was some space inside it, but it was always a surprise to see how different these things looked when they weren't on a TV screen and they were in a setting that hadn't been programmed into a computer to create the visuals.

The engineer Link at the controls drove the vehicle expertly into the large, open door, and allowed it to slid slowly to a halt in the center of the room. I had to admit, that looking out my window made me a bit twitchy to get off the train and walk around.

Ruby looked the same way, except her excitement looked like it had been amplified about a hundred times over. She was sitting across from me literally bouncing in her seat as we pulled in. Of course she was. She'd told me that Spirit Tracks had been her first game. As someone who was likewise interested in games, I could respect that. You never forgot the first one you played in a series you loved.

When the doors opened, Alfonzo was the first one out, followed by a very excited magician. I stepped out after she was gone for the sole reason that I had a feeling that standing in her way at the moment would result in injury.

"Ladies and gentlemen," Raven said, stepping off the train last, "I give you the Tower of Spirits."

**A/N I'm about to start on the next chapter right away. I still have a double update to make up for, remember? Anyway, question time!**

**How did your holiday go? Did you get anything good? **

**Has anyone gotten a chance to play A Link Between Worlds yet? I haven't had the money to get it. **

**Is anyone a fan of the Tales games? If anyone's played TotA, we must get together and talk about Jade- I mean! Talk about the game!**

**And finally, who else is annoyed with the Percy Jackson movies? They are killing me. What is wrong with you, Hollywood? Kronos does not rise in The Sea of Monsters! What happened to turning Percy into a guinea pig!? I wanted to see that! Well, at least it was better than the first one. **


	36. I Am Jumped By A Kangaroo

** Bingo! There, what did I say? I said that I was going to crank out two chapters today! See? I do what I say I'm going to do... sometimes.**

** Disclaimer: If Zelda was mine, I wouldn't write fanfiction, I would write plot lines for games.**

**Chapter 36: I Am Jumped By A Kangaroo (Dakota's POV)**

The first thing I was aware of when I came to was the pain in my head. Have you ever lit your head on fire? I haven't, but I don't have to now because I think I probably know how it would feel. I groaned and brought my hand up to my face, feeling the stickiness as I touched my skin. What happened? Oh, that's right, we'd crashed our ship.

"Oh, goddess," I heard Link's voice, "Guys! I found Dakota!"

I tried to raise my head a bit in order to look at him, keeping my right eye closed in an attempt to keep the blood from trickling into it, but I quickly gave up when I felt the pain in my shoulder. Well, the neck bone is connected to the back bone, and I was pretty sure that somewhere along there, the back bone is connected to the shoulder bones. I was no expert on anatomy, but I guess if you try to lift your head and shoulders and your shoulder is broken, the result is something like this.

"Ow..." I mumbled, "What hit me?" I felt like I'd just been hit by an eighteen wheeler. Of course, those didn't exist in Hyrule, so what was the Hylian equivalent of an eighteen wheeler? A train? A cart? An eighteen wheeled cart?

"Hold still and drink this," Link said. I heard the sound of a cork popping out of a bottle and felt the glass rim pressed to my lips as he helped me sit up a bit, "You were too close to the railing and fell overboard when we hit. There was fog, but the waters weren't rough, so after the rest of us got off in the life boat and made it to shore, me and a few others went to look for you. Don't you remember? You'd banged yourself up pretty badly, but you were clinging to one of the rocks."

Come to think of it, I did remember clinging to a rock. It was either that or go under, so of course that seemed like the better of the two options. I remembered having a hard time because I'd smashed it with my arm after falling over the deck and had just bobbed there and clung with one hand. It was fuzzy though. I must've blanked out a bit after they'd come to get me. "Y-yeah," I replied, "I think I remember that..."

I took a sip of the contents of the bottle and immediately spit it out. "Pfffft! Ew!" It was bitter and nasty, and the texture was something along the lines of drinking a bottle of slugs.

"I know it's bad, but you're going to have to try to get a little down," he said, "Just a little. Come on."

I reached up with my good arm and pinched my nose as I forced myself to swallow. The lack of my sense of smell helped with the taste a bit, but the texture remained as gross as ever. I managed to choke a bit down, gagged, and made a very rude face.

Link put the cork back into the bottle of red liquid and placed it back in his bag. "I know," he said, "Potions are nasty, but they do the trick. Try your arm now."

Hesitantly, I moved my right arm a bit. It was a bit stiff, but the pain had faded. I reached up and wiped the blood off of my forehead. Those scrapes and scratches had healed as well. With the use of my right arm restored, I climbed to my feet.

The rest of the crew was gathered only a short distance away, and seemed to be deep in discussion about the situation at hand. The ship was pretty much useless. Or at least, it was from my point of view. I was in no way an expert of ships, but I was pretty sure that if your boat has huge holes torn down the sides, it's not very sea worthy anymore.

"Yo, my peeps!" I said, approaching the others, "I think you have some holes in your ship."

Everyone nodded solemnly in response except Tetra. Said girl simply turned and shot me an unamused glare. "Thanks for the report," she grumbled, "Now are you just going to stand there and be smart, or are you going to come and help us find someone to fix this mess?"

For once, I wasn't smart with her. The sooner we got the ship repaired, the sooner I could go back to concentrating on finding the others. "Yeah, I'm going," I replied.

Tetra's frown remained in place, but she just nodded without saying anything rude. "The good news is, we were heading for the mainland and it seems that we're on the mainland's coast," she said, then pointed out to the north, "There should be a town out that way. It's a fishing town so I think we can assume that they know how to deal with ships."

"Shouldn't be too hard to find," Nico chimed in, "Straight on through the woods if I remember right. They're not too far back, but they built it away from the beach to avoid the summer heat."

It made since to me. If there was one thing that going to the beach would teach you, it's summer sun, plus sand, plus your bare feet, equals an ouch of the highest degree. I couldn't imagine living in a place where I'd have to walk on hot sand just to get from one end of town to the other.

"Then it's settled," Tetra concluded, "Everyone, move it! We're going to get a repair crew!"

We followed after her towards the trees ahead. My Converses were gathering more sand with every step I took. Hopefully, they were right about this place not being too far away, because I had a feeling that when I got to sit down and empty my shoes, I'd have enough sand in them to build a sandcastle. It didn't help that I wasn't wearing socks, so as I walked along, I was still walking on hot sand even with my shoes on.

The shade was welcome. You always know it's hot when you can actually _feel_ the difference the instant you move into the shade. I immediately reached up and unzipped my hoodie as realization dawned on me. Of course I was hot out here. I'd had my freaking jacket on the entire time.

"Everyone, stay close," Tetra ordered, "There've been monsters around this area lately."

There was a path cleared through the trees. Probably so the people of the village could get to the shore and back more easily. Staying close to the crew wasn't very hard, considering the fact that they were in plain sight from the cleared area.

We'd been walking only for a short time when Tetra suddenly paused. "Shh," she said, "I hear something."

Back in my world, I would have been making up some story about a situation like this in which I killed the monsters like a boss while doing some hardcore parkour moves. In real life though, it was different when you were the only one in a group that didn't have a weapon. Even if I had one, I wouldn't have known how to use it. The only knowledge I had about swords could pretty much be summed up in one quote from "Game of Thrones", "_Stick 'em with the pointy end"_.

The bushes beside me rustled and I jumped back a bit. It wasn't quite far enough. The instant whoever was hiding there jumped out, I found myself plowed to the ground. In a reflexive action, I immediately grabbed for something. Suddenly, I found myself gripping something solid. There was a loud exclamation of "Ouch!", and then the object was gone and I was on my back.

"Ow! Right in the nose!" the fellow complained, "You alternate earth magicians have some sharp magic!"

I lay there for a moment, trying to get my bearings before standing once again. The kangaroo stood there, rubbing his nose with one hand, which was covered with a large boxing glove. "Ah, sorry man!" I apologized, "What did I just do? I have no idea how that happened!"

The kangaroo removed his hand from his nose, which I could now clearly see had been sliced up a bit and was bleeding. "Ow..." he whined again, "Don't worry about it too much, but be more careful with that."

"Hate to disappoint you, bro," I said, "But I can't be careful if I don't know what I did."

"Ah, well," he sighed, "Then just don't worry about it. Anyway, if you can do that little trick, it looks like I've found the right person."

"Er..." I backed up a little. It was probably stupid to take a talking kangaroo so seriously, but I was having a bit of trouble telling if someone meant to help me or hurt me when they told me they'd been looking for me, "And you are?" I asked.

"Sorry," he said, "Name's Ricky. I was sent from the village ahead." The kangaroo made the most sheepish expression a kangaroo possibly could, as if asking 'come on. Don't you trust me?'. "Are you Dakota?"

Frankly, it was becoming harder and harder for me to find a kangaroo intimidating. Heck, I was surrounded by guys with swords. If he was a villain, no matter how unlikely that seemed, it wasn't like I didn't have anyone to help me out here. "Yeah, that's the name," I replied, "Ask me again and I'll tell ya the same."

"Really?" he asked, "Good! Then, we should get rolling! The Oracle of Seasons wants to have a word with you!"

**AN: A little shorter than the last one, but I'm still proud of myself to making my double update. We've had snow and freezing rain up here so I'll try to write again tomorrow. There's not going to be a whole lot else to do, after all. **

**Questions!**

**Does anyone have any good anime they can recommend? I'm catching up with Log Horizon right now. **

**If you write, how are your stories going?**

**How are you tonight?**


End file.
